The analysis of sleep architecture in patients after stroke in supratentorial region and in patients after stroke in brainstem

Tina Kojadin (2015) The analysis of sleep architecture in patients after stroke in supratentorial region and in patients after stroke in brainstem. MSc thesis.

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Abstract

Sleep is an essential physiological process for normal functioning of the body and cognition while being awake. In sleep process the brain frequency is changing while going through sleep phases, which are associated with the activity in various brain regions. These brain regions can be damaged after an ischemic stroke, caused by the blockade in the blood vessel leading to lack of oxygen supply and producing lesions in brain areas, what results in a loss of brain function. As a consequence of a disorder like lesions in the brain, the brain functions are disrupted, what can affect the process of sleep. Studies show, that there are some differences in sleep patterns among healthy sleepers and subjects after stroke, showing that subjects after stroke spent more time in deep sleep and less in REM sleep in comparison with the healthy sleepers. Based on these findings the goal of this study is to analyze sleep architecture among patients after stroke depending on the brain area that was affected by stroke. Regarding to the brain region that was affected by the stroke, there could be some differences in sleep patterns among the patients that could indicate on the neuroanatomical importance on sleep process. There were 51 polysomnograpy (PSG) recording taken from patients after stroke for the study. In all patients the brain magnetic resonance (MRI) was performed to locate the stroke affected area. The points of interest were patients with effected supratentorial regions (43) and patients with stroke in brain stem (8 subjects). The task was to compare their sleep architecture and other sleep features like sleep efficiency, time in bed and awakenings with Matlab R2014b program and to search for statistical significance. All patients in the study provided informed consents and the study was approved by the Institutional ethics committee. The results are indicating on differences in the architecture of sleep in the patients with stroke in the brain stem, showing lower REM latency and lower efficiency then in the patients after stroke in supratentorial regions. These finding are providing evidence how different brain regions can affect different sleep features.

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