Gastric slow wave abnormalities in patients with gastroparesis

The aim of this study was to determine whether cutaneous electrogastrograms (EGGs) could be used to differentiate gastroparetic patients from asymptomatic healthy controls. Pre- and postprandial cutaneous EGGs were obtained from 24 asymptomatic healthy volunteers and 27 patients with gastroparesis documented by a delayed gastric emptying of a solid test meal. A definition of slow wave abnormality was introduced. For the fasted condition, all 24 controls showed highly regular, predominant peaks in the 2-4 cycles/min (cpm) range, in contrast to the patient group in which 11 subjects showed an absence of normal slow wave activity (p less than 0.001). For the postprandial condition, again, all 24 controls showed slow wave normality consisting of increased amplitude and regularity of the 2-4 cpm frequency component. This was in sharp contrast to the patient group in which 13 subjects showed abnormalities (p less than 0.0001). Approximately 75% of the patients had an abnormal pre- or postprandial EGG: four patients had abnormal EGGs both during fasting and after eating, seven patients had abnormal EGGs during fasting but normal EGGs after eating, and nine patients had normal EGGs during fasting but abnormal EGGs after eating. We conclude that the cutaneous EGG may be used to differentiate gastroparetic patients from asymptomatic normals.