Automated epileptic seizure waveform detection method based on the feature of the mean slope of wavelet coefficient counts using a hidden Markov model and EEG signals

Abstract

Long-term electroencephalography (EEG) monitoring is time-consuming, and requires experts to interpret EEG signals to detect seizures in patients. In this paper, we propose a novel automated method called adaptive slope of wavelet coefficient counts over various thresholds (ASCOT) to classify patient episodes as seizure waveforms. ASCOT involves extracting the feature matrix by calculating the mean slope of wavelet coefficient counts over various thresholds in each frequency subband. We validated our method using our own database and a public database to avoid overtuning. The experimental results show that the proposed method achieved a reliable and promising accuracy in both our own database (98.93%) and the public database (99.78%). Finally, we evaluated the performance of the method considering various window sizes. In conclusion, the proposed method achieved a reliable seizure detection performance with a short-term window size. Therefore, our method can be utilized to interpret long-term EEG results and detect momentary seizure waveforms in diagnostic systems.