High levels of discordance between office-based and ambulatory blood pressure measurements for diagnosing optimal blood pressure control in high-risk diabetic populations from a developing country.

This study investigated the concordance between office-based blood pressure (BP) readings and ambulatory BP monitoring (ABPM) in 51 consenting type 2 diabetes patients (25 males) in Cameroon with hypertension who had been receiving stable treatment for at least 3 months. The prevalence of optimal BP control was 63% based on office measurements and 23% based on ABPM. Agreement between the two methods was poor (kappa statistic: 0.15; 95% confidence interval: -0.08 to 0.29). Using ABPM as the standard, office BP was helpful for ruling out optimal BP control (specificity: 75%), but not for ruling it in (sensitivity: 41%). Our results suggest that ABPM should be recommended in such settings as ours only for those patients who have already achieved stable optimal BP control according to office measurements.