Week 7

Hello and welcome to week 7 of my blog!!

My experiment is coming to a close! As I have begun to finish collecting data, I have noticed preliminary trends indicating the effectiveness of gratitude reflection and music listening.

According to the National Institute of Health, “normal blood pressure for most adults is defined as systolic pressure of less than 120 and a diastolic pressure of less than 80. Elevated blood pressure is defined as a systolic pressure between 120 and 129 with a diastolic pressure of less than 80”. The average of the patient’s usual office systolic blood pressure (the upper measurement) was 135.6 mmHg, but after the experimentation, the in-office blood pressure dropped 7% to 126 mmHg. Regarding diastolic blood pressure (the lower measurement), in-office blood pressure after the experiment was 79 mmHg, but based on patient files recorded before the experiment, the diastolic blood pressure in the office was 79.2mmHg – indicating a drop after the experiment of about 1%. Compared to average at-home blood pressure(BP) levels of 124mmHg (systolic) and 74mmHg(diastolic), the after-experiment BP levels were closer to at-home levels.

While not seemingly extremely significant, data collected over the past few weeks have suggested that there are benefits to the benefits of neurohacking on the several forms of hypertension I have studied – white coat, labile (hypertension characterized by fluctuating BP), and controlled (BP remains level and experienced minimal fluctuation).

I will continue to study the data I have collected and begin working on my final research paper. In terms of my experiment, I still need to document more patients who have had their BP taken by women so I can explore the gender bias within medicine further and expand my experimental reach.

Thank you for reading my blog!

See you next week!