ABPM – Ambulatory Blood Pressure Monitoring in Family Medicine Office

Sa？etak Ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) is non invasive method for obtaining blood pressure readings continuously over a 24-hour period giving information about blood pressure during the day and night, while performing usual daily activities in the patient’s known environment. Many studies and guidelines showed that this was the most significant predictor of future cardiovascular events and damages of the target organs. ABPM has multiple value. It enables recording and displaying arterial pressure during 24 hours, what is far more important than occasional ambulatory blood pressure measurement. It identifies patients with “white coat syndrome” and patients with masked hypertension. It also helps detecting a hypotensive crisis in patients on antihypertensive therapy and shows the response to antihypertensive treatment. It can give an insight into the prognosis of the disease because higher values of arterial pressure measured by ABPM are associated with increased mortality. It is also used for research purposes, and has higher costeffective impact than ambulatory measurement of arterial pressure. The studies showed that ABPM findings are more closely related to target organs damage such as: left ventricular hypertrophy, proteinuria, creatinine increase, glomerular filtration reduction, atherosclerotic plaques, retinal artery occlusion, arterial stiffness, and reduced stretchability. Current guidelines of today’s relevant professional societies, both Croatian and European, emphasize its use in primary health care, and is currently the most advanced tool in setting up and managing the diagnosis of arterial hypertension