Use of Self-Measured Blood Pressure Monitoring to Improve Hypertension Equity

Abstract

Purpose of review: To evaluate how self-measured blood pressure (SMBP) monitoring interventions impact hypertension equity.

Recent findings: While a growing number of studies have recruited participants from safety-net settings, racial/ethnic minority groups, rural areas, or lower socio-economic backgrounds, few have reported on clinical outcomes with many choosing to evaluate only patient-reported outcomes (e.g., satisfaction, engagement). The studies with clinical outcomes demonstrate that SMBP monitoring (a) can be successfully adopted by historically excluded patient populations and safety-net settings and (b) improves outcomes when paired with clinical support. There are few studies that explicitly evaluate how SMBP monitoring impacts hypertension disparities and among rural, low-income, and some racial/ethnic minority populations. Researchers need to design SMBP monitoring studies that include disparity reduction outcomes and recruit from broader populations that experience worse hypertension outcomes. In addition to assessing effectiveness, studies must also evaluate how to mitigate multi-level barriers to real-world implementation of SMBP monitoring programs.

Keywords: Blood pressure; Disparities; Hypertension; Self-measured blood pressure; Telemonitoring.

Fig. 1

Multi-level barriers to process for SMBP implementation