Use of short-term bio-impedance for gastric motility assessment

Gastric motility (GM) has been assessed using bio-impedance (BI) techniques in the time domain using short term recordings and analyzing mainly the median of the area under the fast Fourier transform (FFT) spectra. The BI technique has been applied to the gastric system mainly for gastric emptying (GE) studies. However, gastric motility evaluation using BI has not been fully implemented. In this study, we propose the use of the BI technique for the evaluation of gastric motility considering global features of the fast FFT spectra. The study was performed in eleven healthy subjects who were evaluated in fasting and postprandial conditions. The results indicate that the use of the median of the area under the FFT spectra is equivalent to the use of the main peak of the spectra to determine the changes in gastric motility from the fasting to the postprandial state. This demonstrates that BI is a valid technique for gastric motility evaluation in short time recordings.