Neurological functional diagnostics
Ultrasound
Ultrasound techniques and technologies (doppler and duplex) are apt means of painless neck and skull artery measuring without risk. Frequent cerebrovascular insufficiencies turn these examinations into critical means of adapting the treatment to every patient's needs. They belong to the standard set of examinations carried out on stroke patients.
Electroneurography and electromyography
The natural electrical properties of nervous and muscle tissue and abnormal changes to them can be put to good diagnostic use by measuring the current carried through muscles and nerves. When it comes to treating disorders of peripheral nerves and skeletal muscles in particular, so-called electroneurography (ENG) and electromyography (EMG) are critical references doctors need to find the cause of an illness.
Evoked potentials
Another field of electrophysiological activity are the cerebral and vertebral tracts where certain peripheral nerves or the vision and acoustic systems are activated according to a defined pattern to afterwards measure the response of cerebral electric currents (so-called evoked potentials or evoked responses). These methods are typically applied to inflammations of the optic nerve or cases of vitamin deficiency both of which may significantly reduce the electric response of central nerves.
Electroencephalography
The electroencephalogram (EEG) for cerebral nerve activity measuring is still a key instrument for the detection of epileptic diseases and some other cerebral functional disorders. Electrodes attached to the head in several places can help to find the cerebral region of origin of the epilepsy. EEG tests are normally performed between epileptic attacks. EEG derivation from patients sleeping after provoked lack of sleep or ensured by continuous 24h EEG derivation significantly increases the chance of detecting EEG activity typical for epilepsy.
Video EEG monitoring
Patients are taken to our monitoring unit where EEG and video recordings are taken all around the clock. One aim is to solve problems of differential diagnoses (does the patient have an epileptic attack or does he suffer from something else?). However, pre-surgical diagnostic investigation into epilepsy is mainly focussed on recording and analysing epileptic attacks and to combine results with EEG plots to discover the cerebral region that the attacks originate from. Investigations aim at patients whose medication does not provide satisfactory treatment. In these cases, the causing cerebral region will be removed by surgery to free the patients from attacks without damaging any of the major cerebral functions.
Electro-oculography
Electro-oculography (EOG) is a non-invasive method of investigating into vertiginous attacks, allowing a separate examination of the two vestibular nerves. This approach provides a distinction between central dizziness (originating from the brain) and peripheral dizziness (caused in the inner ear or along the vestibular nerve).