Development and Clinical application of the Clustering Index method, a new quantitative analysis of surface EMG

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Needle EMG is widely used as a diagnostic measure of neuromuscular disorders, although significant pain is its definite drawback. We developed a quantitative analysis of the surface EMG (SEMG), Clustering Index (CI) method, which can differentiate between neurogenic and myopathic changes by a non-invasive single-channel SEMG recording. In this study, we refined parameters of the CI method that can achieve best diagnostic yield. Furthermore, we examined 27 children having neuromuscular disorders and found that CI method had moderate diagnostic power even for such pediatric patients. We also experienced a patient who had been long diagnosed as muscular dystrophy, although SEMG of the trapezius muscle revealed a neurogenic change, which lead to documentation of the spinal muscular atrophy by gene analysis. SEMG using CI method is a promising non-invasive measure to evaluate neuromuscular disorders.