High-frequency Oscillations in Children with Epilepsy and Neural Oscillations that Support Attention
Year: 2020
Type: dissertation
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Epilepsy is a brain disorder characterized by frequent and recurrent seizures and interictal discharges. Children with epilepsy are known to manifest significant behavioural and psychosocial comorbidities, most commonly attention deficits. The causes of these impairments are poorly understood. Brain regions that generate seizures are known to express high-frequency oscillations (HFOs), but challenges in automated detection of these events hinder efforts to understand how they relate to neurocognitive deficits in children with epilepsy. In this thesis, I first present an HFO detection framework that I validate on multiple published datasets and intracranial recordings from SickKids. Second, the HFO detector is applied to intracranial recordings from children with epilepsy undergoing an attention-demanding task. My findings demonstrate that HFOs are associated with the disruption of attentive behaviour in children. I further show that this may be mediated by impairment of neural oscillations within the anterior cingulate cortex that support attention.
Source: TSpace (University of Toronto)
Author: Simeon M. Wong
Language: English
Subfield: Clinical Neurology
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3123596268