[Value of quantitative electroencephalography in psychiatry]. / Intérêt de l'électroencéphalographie quantitative en psychiatrie.

ABSTRACT

Computerized quantitative EEG processes the signal in four sequential steps: 1) EEG sampling with rejection of artefacts; 2) Fourier analysis (power spectrum according to frequency); 3) data reduction with computation of spectral parameters in five-minute recordings on at least four EEG channels (mean frequencies, mean amplitudes in microvolts and %, with standard deviations for delta, theta, alpha and beta frequency bands); 4) data base and multivariate statistical analyses. Five main results are obtained by computerized quantitative EEG analysis in psychiatry and clinical pharmacology 1) longitudinal studies of patients before and after treatment; 2) transversal studies of homogeneous EEG groups (discrimination between tracings of residual-type or paranoid-type schizophrenic patients) comparatively with control groups (high and low alpha subjects); 3) study of psychotropic drugs profiles, prediction of action, dose-effect curves, pharmacokinetic studies, biodisponibility, correlations with plasmatic levels and behavioural or clinical psychiatric rating scales; 4) typologic classification and discrimination by multivariate analysis, studies of functional activities functional interhemispheric lateralisation of amplitudes and its variations during the course of psychotic processes; 5) new techniques computerized topo-electroencephalography (CT-EEG, BEAM technique) based on 16 EEG recordings, comparison with other imaging techniques.