Graph Measures of Node Strength for Characterizing Preictal Synchrony in Partial Epilepsy.

Abstract The reference electrophysiological pattern at seizure onset is the “rapid discharge,” as visible on intracerebral electroencephalography (EEG). This discharge typically corresponds to a decrease of synchrony across brain areas. In contrast, the preictal period can exhibit patterns of increased synchrony, which can be quantified by network measures. Our objective was to compare preictal synchrony with a quantification of the rapid discharge as provided by the epileptogenicity index (EI). We investigated 24 seizures from 12 patients recorded by stereotaxic EEG (SEEG). Seizures were classified visually as containing preictal synchrony or not. We computed pairwise nonlinear correlation (h2) across channels in the 8 sec preceding the rapid discharge. The sum of ingoing and outgoing links (IN and OUT node strength), as well as the sum of all links (total strength, TOT) were computed for each region. We tested several filtering schemes, and quantified the capacity of each strength measure to serve as a ...