Evaluation of the "monolog" spike and wave monitor: a study on patients with typical absences

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness and accuracy of the "monolog," a pocket-size spike and wave monitor, in patients with typical absence seizures. Two observers were scoring independently and blindly from the monitor the number and duration of the 3 Hz spike-wave discharges from the EEG recordings of 10 selected patients having typical absences. High correlation was found between the two observers' scorings for both the number and the mean duration of events (Spearman's rank correlation (r): 0.9970, P < 0.001, and 0.9758, P < 0.001), as well as between each of them and the "monolog" for the mean event duration (r: 0.9848, P < 0.001, and 0.9788, P < 0.001). Conversely, a poor correlation was found between each of the observers and the "monolog" for the number of events (r: 0.7121, P = 0.021, and 0.6939, P = 0.026). In conclusion, the "monolog" accurately measured the duration of 3 Hz spike-wave activity; however, it failed to accurately count the number of events that occurred throughout the recordings. We suggest that this device, with appropriate modification to its memory epochs, may be a useful tool in monitoring patients with typical absences.