Evaluation and diagnosis of brain death by Functional near-infrared spectroscopy

Brain death, the irreversible and permanent loss of the brain and brainstem functions, is hard to be judged precisely for some clinical reasons. The traditional diagnostic methods are time consuming, expensive and some are even dangerous. Functional near infrared spectroscopy (FNIRS), using the good scattering properties of major component of blood to NIR, is capable of noninvasive monitoring cerebral hemodynamic responses. Here, we attempt to use portable FNIRS under patients' natural state for brain death diagnosis. Ten brain death patients and seven normal subjects participated in FNIRS measurements. All of them were provided different fractional concentration of inspired oxygen (FIO2) in different time periods. We found that the concentration variation of deoxyhemoglobin concentration (Delta[Hb]) presents the trend of decrease in the both brain death patients and normal subjects with the raise of the FIO2, however, the data in the normal subjects is more significant. And the concentration variation of oxyhemoglobins concentration (Delta[HbO(2)]) emerges the opposite trends. Thus Delta[HbO(2)]/Delta[Hb] in brain death patients is significantly higher than normal subjects, and emerges the rising trend as time went on. The findings indicated the potential of FNIRS-measured hemodynamic index in diagnosing brain death.