Developing a Protocol for Medical Student-Organized Community-Based Hypertension Screening Programs

• Main Authors: Vishal P. Varshney, Tyrone Harrison, Michal Szymczakowski, Matthew Gross, Charlotte Jones
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: International Journal of Medical Students 2013-11-01
• Series: International Journal of Medical Students
• Online Access: http://www.ijms.info/ojs/index.php/IJMS/article/view/5

<p><strong>Background:</strong><span> Hypertension screening programs have been effective in raising awareness and identifying people who are otherwise unfamiliar with their disease. We aimed to develop a resource-minimal, evidence-based protocol for a novel medical student-organized hypertension-screening program capable of community implementation.</span></p><p><strong>Methods:</strong><span> Eighty-one medical students had their blood pressure measured once using an automated machine and once using the manual auscultatory method. Bland-Altman plots compared agreement between measurement techniques.</span></p><p><strong>Results:</strong><span> No significant difference between manual and automated techniques was noted in the measurement of systolic blood pressure, but was noted for diastolic blood pressure. </span></p><p><strong>Conclusion:</strong><span> In the context of a community-based screening program, automated and manual measurements may be used interchangeably to obtain an accurate measure of systolic blood pressure. A medical student-organized community-screening program is an effective way to screen large numbers of people in a short amount of time.</span></p>