A method for triggering cell transition in an uplink power limited condition is disclosed. The method can include a wireless communication device determining that the wireless communication device is experiencing an uplink power limited condition; deriving a modified downlink channel quality measurement by adjusting a measured downlink channel quality to indicate a lower downlink channel quality than the measured downlink channel quality; generating a measurement report including the modified downlink channel quality measurement; and sending the measurement report to the serving cell to trigger transition of the wireless communication device from the serving cell to a second cell.