Eli5: Why is our blood pressure considered more accurate sitting down?

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I’ve never understood why doctors tell us to take our blood pressures after sitting down for a little while. Like…wouldn’t it be better to know what your BP is when you’re walking around since it changes quite a bit?

Isn’t it bad if a BP is really high at any point, even while walking?

In: Biology

3 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

No because like you said “it changes quite a bit” it would be inaccurate to check it while you’re moving because the amount of exertion used is inconsistent, the only thing you can do that’s the same everywhere else is doing nothing.

Anonymous 0 Comments

no because the idea is to get a baseline.

so for instance, if your bp is high when you’re resting, you would know there’s an issue.

if your bp is higher after some type of exercise, then you wouldn’t know that it wasn’t from exertion or from a health issue

hope that helped.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s for resting blood pressure because that will pretty much always be consistent. Excercise can cause readings all over the place depending on how much you’re exerting yourself.