Latency of eye movement and other REM sleep parameters in bipolar depression.

Parameters of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep were measured in 10 endogenous bipolar depressive drug-free patients and in healthy subjects. A significant reduction of eye movement latency and larger standard deviations in the values for activity and density of eye movement were found in the depressed patients. The method applied in this study, embodying an aspect of cybernetic theory in pattern recognition, proved very useful for the elaboration of the biological data.