A single clinic measurement of blood pressure (BP) may be common in low- and middle-income countries because of limited medical resources. This study aimed to examine the potential misclassification error when only one BP measurement is used. Participants (n = 14,706, 53.5% females) aged 25–64 years were selected by multistage stratified cluster sampling from eight provinces, each representing one of the eight geographical regions of Vietnam. Measurements were made using the World Health Organization STEPS protocols. Data were analyzed using complex survey methods. For systolic BP, 62.7% had a higher first reading whereas 30.0% had a lower first reading, and 27.3% had a reduction of at least 5 mmHg whereas 9.6% had an increase of at least 5 mmHg. Irrespective of direction of change, increased variability in BP was associated with greater age, urban living, greater body size and fatness, reduced physical activity levels, elevated glucose, and raised total cholesterol. These measurement variations would lead to substantial misclassification in diagnosis of hypertension based on a single reading because almost 20% of subjects would receive a different diagnosis based on the mean of two readings.

由于医疗资源有限，在低收入和中等收入国家中，临床血压的单一测量可能很常见。本研究旨在检查仅使用一次BP测量时的潜在错误分类错误。通过多阶段分层整群抽样从八个省份中选择年龄在25-64岁之间的参与者（n = 14,706，女性占53.5％），每个省代表越南的八个地理区域之一。使用世界卫生组织STEPS协议进行测量。使用复杂的调查方法分析数据。对于收缩压，首次读数较高的占62.7％，而最低读数的30.0％，降低了至少5 mmHg的占27.3％，而升高了至少5 mmHg的占9.6％。不论变化的方向如何，血压变异性的增加与年龄的增长有关，城市生活，更大的体型和肥胖程度，降低的体育活动水平，升高的葡萄糖和升高的总胆固醇。这些测量结果的变化将导致基于单一读数的高血压诊断的严重错误分类，因为几乎有20％的受试者会基于两次读数的平均值得到不同的诊断。