Artifacts During Short-Term Interictal Electroencephalographic Recording in Dogs

Abstract

The electroencephalogram (EEG) is an electrodiagnostic technique widely used in both scientific research and clinical medicine. It makes it possible to study the neurophysiology of brain activity by recording real-time changes in electrical potential produced by cortical activation. The importance of EEG in diagnosing canine epilepsy demonstrates its usefulness when the owner's description of crises is not clear or when the episodes cannot be differentiated from behavioral or cardiac disorders. However, EEG recordings also often record electrical activity from sources other than the brain, which may interfere with the clinical event-related signal. This activity is known as artifactual electrical activity, and the signal changes recorded in these cases corrupt the trace when they are superimposed on brain activity or even, in some cases, mimic pathologic abnormalities. The first step in analyzing and interpreting EEG traces is to recognize artifacts and other specific transient events. This retrospective study set out to ascertain whether artifacts comparable to those described in humans are observed in protocols used to perform short-term interictal EEG for canine epilepsy and how these can be classified.

Neuronal current imaging: An experimental method to investigate electrical currents in dogs with idiopathic epilepsy

“…Despite its known anticonvulsant properties, 29 propofol does not suppress spontaneous epileptiform activity completely and therefore is considered as an alternative anesthetic agent for dogs undergoing general anesthesia for EEG 29‐31 . It seems essential to prevent artifacts generated by contractions of muscles covering the skull 28,30,32 . Therefore, the use of a non‐depolarizing peripheral muscle relaxant is reasonable, and its successful application has been described in previous studies 30 .…”

Effect of prior general anesthesia or sedation and antiseizure drugs on the diagnostic utility of wireless video electroencephalography in dogs

“…Electroencephalography is rarely used clinically to differentiate epileptic seizures from nonepileptic paroxysmal episodes in dogs, mostly because of technical difficulties and lack of a standardized protocol. [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] More specifically, the confounding factors that influence the diag- with AEEG. [27][28][29] Three dogs in our population received 4 to 6 ASD (1 dog received These data support further questions about the potential use of AEEG as a monitoring tool for epileptic patients.…”

“…Electroencephalography is rarely used clinically to differentiate epileptic seizures from nonepileptic paroxysmal episodes in dogs, mostly because of technical difficulties and lack of a standardized protocol 6‐16 . More specifically, the confounding factors that influence the diagnostic capability of electroencephalography are not known.…”

“…This impractical clinical application of EEG in veterinary medicine partly may explain the lack of protocol standardization, which makes it difficult to compare findings between different recordings. [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] Nonetheless, EEG has proven useful in veterinary medicine to detect epileptic activity that was not clinically observable. 17,18 In recent years, the use of ambulatory video EEG (AEEG) has been reported in dogs.…”

“…Electroencephalography is not commonly performed in veterinary medicine for several technical reasons such as difficulty to place and maintain several functional electrodes as well as the need for special training to interpret it with ease. This impractical clinical application of EEG in veterinary medicine partly may explain the lack of protocol standardization, which makes it difficult to compare findings between different recordings 6‐16 . Nonetheless, EEG has proven useful in veterinary medicine to detect epileptic activity that was not clinically observable 17,18 .…”