Here's how to check Blood Pressure at home

The heart pumps blood through the blood vessels throughout the body. Blood pressure refers to the amount of pressure experienced by the walls of the blood vessels. Measuring the blood pressure will give you an indication of how much strain the heart is facing while pumping the blood.

A doctor measures your blood pressure at the clinic while you visit him. However, measuring blood pressure is a simple thing you can do yourself at home. Learning how to measure blood pressure can help improve your lifestyle and also prevent a critical diagnosis at a later stage.

You will need the following to check your blood pressure

• A stethoscope
• A blood pressure cuff attached with a squeezable balloon
• An aneroid monitor that will give measurements on the numbered dial
  
  

Check your blood pressure this way

Rest your arm on the table. Wrap the cuff on the bicep and squeeze the balloon to increase the pressure.

Keep watching the aneroid monitor and increase the pressure with the reading moving above 180 mm Hg. Place the stethoscope inside the elbow crease just below the cuff.

Deflate the balloon and listen to the stethoscope. When the first beat hits, note the number shown by the aneroid meter. This will give you the systolic pressure. When the steady heart beat sound stops, note down the aneroid meter reading once again. This will give you the diastolic pressure. These two numbers will give you the blood pressure reading.

As per the American Heart Association, a reading of 120/80 mm Hg is normal. If the numbers go up than this value, then it can indicate that the heart is working too much to pump the blood which will be termed as hypertension.