Ambulatory Blood Pressure Monitoring (ABPM) measures your blood pressure at regular intervals over a 24 hour period while you carry out your normal daily routine, including during sleep. It provides a detailed profile of how your blood pressure behaves across a full day and night, offering insights that isolated clinic readings cannot.
ABPM is particularly useful for identifying white coat hypertension and masked hypertension, and for evaluating blood pressure variability. It plays a key role in confirming a diagnosis of hypertension, assessing how well treatment is working, and guiding personalised cardiovascular risk management.
ABPM is helpful when clinic readings are borderline or inconsistent, when white coat or masked hypertension is suspected, or when your doctor wants to confirm a diagnosis before starting lifelong treatment. It is also useful for checking whether existing treatment is working across the whole day.
A small cuff on your upper arm connects to a lightweight monitor worn on a belt or strap. It inflates gently at set intervals during the day and overnight, and records each reading. You continue your normal routine, keep your arm still during each reading, and sleep as usual, then return the device the next day. Wearing a loose fitting top makes the cuff more comfortable.
ABPM assists in confirming a diagnosis of hypertension, characterising white coat and masked patterns, assessing nocturnal dipping, and evaluating treatment efficacy and variability. Reports include the 24 hour, daytime and night-time averages with clinical interpretation.
