Greco Alberto, Valenza Gaetano, Lanata Antonio, Rota Giuseppina, Scilingo Enzo Pasquale
IEEE J Biomed Health Inform. 2014 Nov;18(6):1865-73. doi: 10.1109/JBHI.2014.2300940.
Bipolar patients are characterized by a pathological unpredictable behavior, resulting in fluctuations between states of depression and episodes of mania or hypomania. In the current clinical practice, the psychiatric diagnosis is made through clinician-administered rating scales and questionnaires, disregarding the potential contribution provided by physiological signs. The aim of this paper is to investigate how changes in the autonomic nervous system activity can be correlated with clinical mood swings. More specifically, a group of ten bipolar patients underwent an emotional elicitation protocol to investigate the autonomic nervous system dynamics, through the electrodermal activity (EDA), among different mood states. In addition, a control group of ten healthy subjects were recruited and underwent the same protocol. Physiological signals were analyzed by applying the deconvolutive method to reconstruct EDA tonic and phasic components, from which several significant features were extracted to quantify the sympathetic activation. Experimental results performed on both the healthy subjects and the bipolar patients supported the hypothesis of a relationship between autonomic dysfunctions and pathological mood states.
双相情感障碍患者的特点是行为病理性不可预测，导致抑郁状态与躁狂或轻躁狂发作之间的波动。在当前的临床实践中，精神科诊断是通过临床医生使用的评定量表和问卷进行的，而忽略了生理体征可能提供的信息。本文的目的是研究自主神经系统活动的变化如何与临床情绪波动相关。更具体地说，一组十名双相情感障碍患者接受了情绪诱发方案，以通过皮肤电活动（EDA）研究不同情绪状态下的自主神经系统动态。此外，招募了一组十名健康受试者作为对照组，并让他们接受相同的方案。通过应用反卷积方法重建EDA的紧张性和相位性成分来分析生理信号，从中提取了几个重要特征以量化交感神经激活。对健康受试者和双相情感障碍患者进行的实验结果支持了自主神经功能障碍与病理性情绪状态之间存在关联的假设。
