Trial reportBlood pressure monitoring2016
Comparison of stethoscope bell and diaphragm, and of stethoscope tube length, for clinical blood pressure measurement.
Trial report in Blood pressure monitoring, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- 2019 AHA/ACC Clinical Performance and Quality Measures for Adults With High Blood Pressure: A Report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Performance Measures.Journal of the American College of Cardiology · 2019Guideline
- 2019 AHA/ACC Clinical Performance and Quality Measures for Adults With High Blood Pressure: A Report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Performance Measures.Circulation. Cardiovascular quality and outcomes · 2019Guideline
- Preventing troublesome variability in clinical blood pressure measurement.Journal of human hypertension · 2025Article
- Measurement of Blood Pressure in Humans: A Scientific Statement From the American Heart Association.Hypertension (Dallas, Tex. : 1979) · 2019Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveThis study investigated the effect of stethoscope side and tube length on auscultatory blood pressure (BP) measurement.
methodsThirty-two healthy participants were studied. For each participant, four measurements with different combinations of stethoscope characteristics (bell or diaphragm side, standard or short tube length) were each recorded at two repeat sessions, and eight Korotkoff sound recordings were played twice on separate days to one experienced listener to determine the systolic and diastolic BPs (SBP and DBP). Analysis of variance was carried out to study the measurement repeatability between the two repeat sessions and between the two BP determinations on separate days, as well as the effects of stethoscope side and tube length.
resultsThere was no significant paired difference between the repeat sessions and between the repeat determinations for both SBP and DBP (all P-values>0.10, except the repeat session for SBP using short tube and diaphragm). The key result was that there was a small but significantly higher DBP on using the bell in comparison with the diaphragm (0.66 mmHg, P=0.007), and a significantly higher SBP on using the short tube in comparison with the standard length (0.77 mmHg, P=0.008).
conclusionThis study shows that stethoscope characteristics have only a small, although statistically significant, influence on clinical BP measurement. Although this helps understand the measurement technique and resolves questions in the published literature, the influence is not clinically significant.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.