Source distribution of neuromagnetic slow wave activity in schizophrenic and depressive patients.

Objective: Focal slow waves in the delta and theta frequency range frequently appear in psychopathological conditions. Due to their focal nature they can be localized by dipole modeling. We previously reported regional clustering of slow waves in temporal and parietal cortex of schizophrenic patients whereas such activity is largely absent in normals. Here we examine, to what extent distribution of slow wave generators differentiates schizophrenic from depressive syndromes.

Methods: The regional densities of generators of focal slow waves were determined during resting conditions in patients with DSM-IV diagnoses of schizophrenia (N=25) and depression (N=27) and in 18 healthy controls.

Results: Schizophrenic patients demonstrated accentuated temporal and parietal delta and theta dipole clustering, when compared to both the control and the depressive sample. In contrast, depressive patients had reduced frontal and prefrontal delta and theta dipole density relative to both schizophrenics and controls. This pattern was not related to age. Men generally displayed somewhat higher slow wave activity than women. For the areas of most pronounced slow wave deviances activity within each group was related to symptom scores: higher left-temporal slow wave activity was associated with hallucinations in schizophrenics, suppression of left-prefrontal slow wave activity correlated with depression scores.

Conclusions: Results suggest that slow wave distribution may assist in differentially diagnosing psychopathological conditions.