Korean J Biol Psychiatry.  2009 May;16(2):69-75.

Severity of Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Heart Rate Variability : Detrended Fluctuation Analysis

Affiliations
  • 1Department of Neuropsychiatry, Chungbuk National University of Medicine and Medical Research Institute, Cheongju, Korea. baugita@gmail.com
  • 2Department of Psychiatry, Konkuk University School of Medicine, Seoul, Korea.

Abstract


OBJECTIVES
: The detrended fluctuation analysis is one of the nonlinear methods for the investigation of biological time series. It quantifies the fractal scaling properties and is known to be useful in the evaluation of long-range correlations in time series. The heart rate variability(HRV) of obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) patients during nighttime was analyzed by detrended fluctuation analysis to assess its relationship with the severity of the symptoms.
METHODS
: Fifty nine untreated male OSAS patients with moderate to severe symptoms(mean age=45.4+/-11.7 years, apnea-hypopnea index, AHI> or = 15) underwent nocturnal polysomnography. Moderate(AHI=15-30, N=22) and severe(AHI>30, N=37) OSAS patients were compared for the indices derived from detrended fluctuation analysis and frequency domain analysis of HRV.
RESULTS
: In the detrended fluctuation analysis, the alpha values were 0.75+/-0.11 and 0.82+/-0.07 for the severe and the moderate OSAS groups respectively. The difference was significant(p<.01). The alpha value had negative correlation with AHI(r=-.425, p=.001). Negative correlation coefficients were also found in the relationships between the alpha values and very low frequency(VLF)(r=-.425, p=.001), low frequency(LF)(r=-.633, p= <.001) and the LF/HF ratio(r=-.305, p=.019) respectively. LF/HF ratio(p=.005) was higher in the severe OSAS group compared to that of the moderate OSAS group.
CONCLUSION
: In this study, the detrended fluctuation analysis showed the significant difference between the two OSAS groups classified according to their severity of symptoms. The scaling exponent showed the negative correlation with AHI and indicies of frequency domain analysis. This result suggests that detrended fluctuation analysis can be helpful to estimate the severity of OSAS.

Keyword

Detrended fluctuation analysis; Heart rate variability; Obstructive sleep apnea

MeSH Terms

Fractals
Heart
Heart Rate
Humans
Male
Polysomnography
Sleep Apnea, Obstructive
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