A fuzzy rule-based system for epileptic seizure detection in intracranial EEG

Objective: We present a method for automatic detection of seizures in intracranial EEG recordings from patients suffering from medically intractable focal epilepsy. Methods: We designed a fuzzy rule-based seizure detection system based on knowledge obtained from experts' reasoning. Temporal, spectral, and complexity features were extracted from IEEG segments, and spatio-temporally integrated using the fuzzy rule-based system for seizure detection. A total of 302.7 h of intracranial EEG recordings from 21 patients having 78 seizures was used for evaluation of the system. Results: The system yielded a sensitivity of 98.7%, a false detection rate of 0.27/h, and an average detection latency of 11 s. There was only one missed seizure. Most of false detections were caused by high-amplitude rhythmic activities. The results from the system correlate well with those from expert visual analysis. Conclusion: The fuzzy rule-based seizure detection system enabled us to deal with imprecise boundaries between interictal and ictal IEEG patterns. Significance: This system may serve as a good seizure detection tool with high sensitivity and low false detection rate for monitoring long-term IEEG. (C) 2009 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.