Melatonin in Epilepsy: A New Mathematical Model of Diurnal Secretion

Purpose. The main objective of the study was to create a mathematical model that describes the melatonin circadian secretion and, then the functionality of the model was tested by a comparison of the melatonin secretions in children with and without epilepsy. Material and Methods. The patients were...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Justyna Paprocka, Marek Kijonka, Marcin Pęcka, Maria Sokół
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Hindawi Limited 2016-01-01
Series:International Journal of Endocrinology
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/3861461
Description
Summary:Purpose. The main objective of the study was to create a mathematical model that describes the melatonin circadian secretion and, then the functionality of the model was tested by a comparison of the melatonin secretions in children with and without epilepsy. Material and Methods. The patients were divided into the epilepsy group (EG, n=52) and the comparison group (CG, n=30). The melatonin level was assessed by a radioimmunoassay method. The diurnal melatonin secretion was described using a nonlinear least squares method. Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient was chosen to estimate the dependence of the acquired data. The model reproduces blood concentration profiles and its parameters were statistically analyzed using the Mann-Whitney-Wilcoxon test and logistic regression. Results. The correlation analysis performed for the EG and CG groups showed moderate correlations between age and the melatonin secretion model parameters. Patients with epilepsy are characterized by an increased phase shift of melatonin release.
ISSN:1687-8337
1687-8345