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Review
. 2021 May 25;11(6):697.
doi: 10.3390/brainsci11060697.

Narrative Review: Quantitative EEG in Disorders of Consciousness

Betty Wutzl  1   2 , Stefan M Golaszewski  3   4   5 , Kenji Leibnitz  1   6 , Patrick B Langthaler  3   7   8 , Alexander B Kunz  3   4 , Stefan Leis  3   9 , Kerstin Schwenker  3   4   5   9 , Aljoscha Thomschewski  3   5   9 , Jürgen Bergmann  3   5 , Eugen Trinka  3   4   5   9
Affiliations
Review

Narrative Review: Quantitative EEG in Disorders of Consciousness

Betty Wutzl et al. Brain Sci. .

Abstract

In this narrative review, we focus on the role of quantitative EEG technology in the diagnosis and prognosis of patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome and minimally conscious state. This paper is divided into two main parts, i.e., diagnosis and prognosis, each consisting of three subsections, namely, (i) resting-state EEG, including spectral power, functional connectivity, dynamic functional connectivity, graph theory, microstates and nonlinear measurements, (ii) sleep patterns, including rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, slow-wave sleep and sleep spindles and (iii) evoked potentials, including the P300, mismatch negativity, the N100, the N400 late positive component and others. Finally, we summarize our findings and conclude that QEEG is a useful tool when it comes to defining the diagnosis and prognosis of DOC patients.

Keywords: EEG; diagnosis; disorders of consciousness; minimally conscious state; prognosis; quantitative EEG; unresponsive wakefulness syndrome.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
PRISMA flow chart (following the example in [42]) explaining our inclusion and exclusion criteria.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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