Vanhatalo Sampsa, Tallgren P, Andersson S, Sainio K, Voipio J, Kaila K
Department of Biosciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
Clin Neurophysiol. 2002 Nov;113(11):1822-5. doi: 10.1016/s1388-2457(02)00292-4.
The objective of this study is to test the hypothesis that the immature human brain exhibits slow electrical activity that is not detected by conventional (i.e. high-pass filtered) electroencephalography (EEG).
Six healthy preterm infants (conceptional age 33-37 weeks) were recorded bedside with direct current (DC) EEG during sleep. Epochs with quiet sleep were selected to study the delta frequency bursts during discontinuous EEG patterns (trace discontinu or trace alternant), and we compared the waveforms obtained without filtering (i.e. genuine DC-EEG) to those seen after high pass filtering of the same traces.
In all infants, DC-EEG demonstrated that the typical delta frequency bursts are consistently embedded in very large amplitude (200-700 microV) and long lasting (1-5s) occipitally negative transients, which are not seen in conventional EEG.
Our study demonstrates that (i) the most prominent spontaneous EEG activity of a sleeping preterm infant consists of very slow, large amplitude transients, and (ii) the most salient features of these transients are not seen in conventional EEG. Proper recording of this type of brain activity by DC-EEG provides a novel way for non-invasive assessment of neonatal brain function.
本研究的目的是检验以下假设，即未成熟的人类大脑表现出缓慢的电活动，而这种活动无法通过传统的（即高通滤波）脑电图（EEG）检测到。
对6名健康的早产儿（孕龄33 - 37周）在睡眠期间进行床边直流（DC）脑电图记录。选择安静睡眠期来研究不连续脑电图模式（脑电图间断或脑电图交替）期间的δ频率爆发，并且我们将未滤波（即真正的直流脑电图）获得的波形与对相同记录进行高通滤波后看到的波形进行比较。
在所有婴儿中，直流脑电图显示典型的δ频率爆发始终嵌入非常大的幅度（200 - 700微伏）且持续时间长（1 - 5秒）的枕部负向瞬变中，而这些在传统脑电图中是看不到的。
我们的研究表明，（i）睡眠中的早产儿最显著的自发脑电图活动由非常缓慢、大幅度的瞬变组成，并且（ii）这些瞬变的最显著特征在传统脑电图中看不到。通过直流脑电图对这类脑活动进行适当记录为新生儿脑功能的无创评估提供了一种新方法。
