RUNNING HEAD: Temperature and Blood Pressure Hobelmann et al.

TURN UP THE A/C: HOW WARMER TEMPERATURES AFFECT BLOOD PRESSURE

Lyndsey Hobelmann1, Hannah Payne, and Caitlin Sullivan
Life Science Academy, Owensboro Community and Technical College, Owensboro KY, 42301

ABSTRACT
High blood pressure is a problem many people face. It can lead to issues in health, including
heart disease and stroke. There is a myriad of different things that affect blood pressure. One of
those things that is subtly affecting blood pressure is temperature. As the temperature goes up,
blood pressure goes down. Keeping room temperature up and staying in warmer environments
could be beneficial for helping high blood pressure. We did an experiment using the Logger
Pro program to test how certain environments affected blood pressure. Technical difficulties
arose, though, and may have changed our results. Looking deeper into the subject would be
necessary to see if high temperatures lower blood pressure enough to change heart health in the
long run.

KEY WORDS: blood pressure, temperature, warm environments, room temperature, Logger
Pro

INTRODUCTION
1 Corresponding author email: lyndseyhobelmann@aol.com
1

Throughout this paper you will need to have a good understanding of what blood pressure is.
There are two types of blood pressures: systolic and diastolic. Systolic is read on top and
diastolic is read on the bottom. Blood pressure is measured in milligrams of mercury (mg/Hg).
Since blood is fluid running through your body, it exerts pressure on the walls of the vessels.
Systolic blood pressure is the pressure on the arteriole wall while the heart contracts, whereas
diastolic is the pressure on the blood vessels when the heart relaxes. An ideal blood pressure is
120 mm/Hg /70 mm/Hg.
It is reported that heart attack and stroke are more common in the winter (British Heart
Foundation, nd) Previous research has shown that blood pressure is higher in colder temperatures
due to the narrowing of blood vessels (Sheps, Sheldon, 2015). This means that blood pressure
could potentially change with room temperature. This raises a question. Can we change blood
pressure, reducing the risk of heart attack and stroke simply by changing the room temperature?
We hypothesized that if we monitored subjects blood pressures in warm and cold environments,
their blood pressure would go up and down with temperature changes.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The materials used in this lab included a computer with Vernier Logger Pro software, Vernier
LabQuest Mini with accompanying USB cable, a Vernier Blood Pressure sensor, ice, warm
water, and two bowls. We had male and female participants, all in the age range of 14-15. Each
test subject received a systolic, diastolic, and MAP reading through the Vernier Logger Pro
software.
We first recorded the normal blood pressure of the test subject by wrapping the cuff of
the Vernier Blood Pressure sensor around the subjects arm while they were sitting in a room
temperature environment, with their arm on the counter. We then make sure Vernier Logger Pro

is set up properly, and select collect on the data collection toolbar. We then pump the Vernier
Blood Pressure sensor until the pressure reaches 150 mm Hg. Once the pressure150 mm Hg the
cuff will slowly release the pressure and calculate the blood pressure of the individual. We
recorded the data from each reading in our lab notebooks and in an Excel worksheet.
We used the subjects normal blood pressure as the control. We then recorded data the
same way after the subject immersed their hands in ice cold water for one minute. We then
waited for the subjects hands turn back to their normal temperature. After this, we immersed the
subjects hands in warm water for one minute. The blood pressure of each test subject was taken
directly after the one minute of immersion in cold and warm water.

RESULTS
Blood pressure readings for the mean arterial pressure are normal when they are in the 70
mmHg to 110 mm/Hg range according to LiDCO Group (2016). Participants 1, 3 ,4, 5, 7, 8, and
10 are all in the normal range for MAP (table 1). After the cold water, the blood pressure of
participants 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 went down, while the blood pressure of 1, 3, 4, and 10 went down
(table 1). After the hot water, participants 1, 2, 6, and 9 had their blood pressure decrease, while
3, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 10 had their blood pressure rise (table 1). With the cold water, the blood pressure
decreases were minimal, with the exceptions of participant 9 and 6, while the increases were
great (figure 1). The opposite was shown with the results from the hot water. The decreases of
blood pressure were great, while the increase in blood pressure was minimal for participants
(figure 1). On average, the blood pressure rose after cold water, while the blood pressure
decreased after cold water (figure 1). Many problems with Logger Pro played a major part with
inconsistencies in the data, making the results unreliable.

DISCUSSION
Our data was somewhat all over the place. This was due to the interference with other
technology. Also, we were unable to change the temperature of the entire room. Most of the
time, blood pressure went up in cold temperatures. Ideally, we would be able to record both
systolic and diastolic blood pressure. We were unable to record both systolic and diastolic blood
pressures because we had technical difficulties. Other technology could have interfered with our
equipment. We would have collected mare reliable data if we had been on a more controlled
environment.
Our data was not the most reliable because we didnt have access to multiple ages and
races. Ideally we would have been able to test subjects of all ages and multiple races. We only
tested on adolescents. Our data would have also been more reliable if we had more test subjects.
We only tested ten subjects.
Our hypothesis was disproven. We thought that blood pressure would increase in warm
temperatures and decrease in cooler temperature. Even though our results were not totally
consistent or perfectly accurate due to technical difficulties, limited time, and limited
environments; we were able to draw some conclusions. We concluded that blood pressure goes
down in warm temperatures and up in cool temperatures.
In conclusion, it would be ideal to change a few things in this experiment. We should
have tested different age groups, been in a controlled environment, and repeated the test several
times.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to thank the Life Science Academy for supplying our equipment that was needed
for the experiment, Owensboro Community and Technical College for allowing us to use their
space, all participants in this experiment for allowing us to test you, and to Mrs. Mountjoy for
helping through writing the manuscript and the experiment.

LITERATURE CITED
British Heart Foundation. (nd). Beat the Cold This Winter. [accessed 23 March 3016] .

Retrieved from https://www.bhf.org.uk/heart-matters-magazine/medical/beat-the-cold.

LiDCO. 2016. Normal Hemodynamic Parameters.
http://www.lidco.com/clinical/hemodynamic.php. Date accessed (20/03/16)
Sheps, Sheldon. (2015). Can Cold Weather or Seasonal Changes in Weather Affect Blood
Pressure?. Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. [accessed 23 March
2016]. Retrieved from http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/high-bloodpressure/expert-answers/blood-pressure/faq-20058250.

Table 1. Mean arterial pressure (MAP) blood pressure readings on all the tem participants in the
warm, cold, and normal temperature environments.

Figure 1. Bar graph that shows the different blood pressure readings for each
participant and the average in the three different environments that we tested.