Improving the identification of people with dementia in primary care: evaluation of the impact of primary care dementia coding guidance on identified prevalence.

Objective: Improving dementia care is a policy priority nationally and internationally; there is a 'diagnosis gap' with less than half of the cases of dementia ever diagnosed. The English Health Department's Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) encourages primary care recognition and recording of dementia. The codes for dementia are complex with the possibility of underidentification through miscoding.

Rapid assessment of blood pressure in the obstetric day unit using Microlife MaM technology.

Objective: To compare MaM technology with current methods of assessing blood pressure (BP) over time on the obstetric day unit.

Background: It is recommended that the average of repeated measures is used to confirm hypertension in pregnancy. The Microlife 3AC1 is a validated oscillometric device featuring "MaM" mode using the average of at least 3 BP readings 15 seconds apart.

Validation of a non-mercury digital auscultatory device with manual pressure registration (PMS Mandaus).

Objective: To assess the clinical accuracy of a non-mercury digital auscultatory device (PMS Mandaus) with manual pressure registration in an adult population.

Methods: The accuracy of the device was assessed by predefined criteria (European Society of Hypertension protocol) in 33 study participants recruited from among patients and staff in a teaching hospital. A series of same-arm sequential blood pressure measurements were taken: first, two observers taking simultaneous mercury readings, followed by a reading with the device.