1 National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland 20014
I would like to comment on the commentary by Mitchell et al.1
While the authors admit that their data in Table I ("Percentile Values for Blood Pressure by Age") are "neither ideal nor perfect" and cite three references from which their data were obtained,2-4 several facts should be known by the reader.
The 50th and 95th percentiles for the systolic and diastolic pressures for the age group 0 to 6 months are apparently from one study3 and are not an average of the three studies as stated, since the studies of Zinner et al.2 and Londe4 were reported for age groups 2 to 14 years and 4 to 15 years, respectively.