Researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have shown in two separate studies, that EEG tests offer a clinical approach that could be used to help diagnose persons at risk for developing mental illness later in life, as well as an approach for measuring the efficacies of different treatment options.
One of the studies, reported online Oct. 23 in Schizophrenia Research, shows that schizophrenia patients don’t register subtle changes in reoccurring sounds as well as others and that this deficit can be measured by recording patterns of electrical brain activity obtained through electroencephalography (EEG).
The second, published online earlier this month in NeuroImage: Clinical, establishes a link between certain EEG tests and patients’ cognitive and psychosocial impairments, suggesting that the EEG test could be used to objectively measure the severity of a patient’s condition, and conversely that it might be possible to alleviate some of the symptoms of schizophrenia with specialized cognitive exercises designed to strengthen auditory processing.
“We are at the point where we can begin to bring simple EEG tests into the clinical setting to help patients,” said Gregory Light, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry and a co-author on both studies. “We think it may be possible to train some patients’ auditory circuits to function better. This could improve their quality of life, and possibly reduce common symptoms of schizophrenia such as hearing voices.”