Comparison of complexity and spectral indices of skin-surface laser-doppler signals in patients with breast cancer receiving chemotherapy and Kuan-Sin-Yin

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Chen, Chao-Tsung^{a; b; c} | Hsu, Chung-Hua^{a; d; *} | Liu, Jyh-Rou^e | Wu, Hung-Bo^f | Chou, Yi-Sheng^f | Hsiu, Hsin^{e; g; h; *}

Affiliations: [a] Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan | [b] Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Taipei City Hospital RenAi Branch, Taipei, Taiwan | [c] General Education Center, University of Taipei, Taipei, Taiwan | [d] Branch of Linsen and Chinese Medicine, Taipei City Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan | [e] Graduate Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei, Taiwan | [f] Division of Hematology and Oncology, Department of Medicine, Taipei City Hospital, Renai Branch, Taipei, Taiwan | [g] Biomedical Engineering Research Center, National Defense Medical Center, Taipei, Taiwan | [h] Graduate Institute of Applied Science and Technology, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei, Taiwan

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding authors: Hsin Hsiu and Chung-Hua Hsu, (Hsin Hsiu) No. 43, Section 4, Keelung Road, Graduate Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology; (Chung-Hua Hsu) Institute of Traditional Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, 155, Li-Nong St, Sec 2, Peitou, Taipei 10607, Taiwan. Tel.: (Hsin Hsiu) +1 886 22730 3730; Fax: (Hsin Hsiu) +1 886 2 2730 3733; (Hsin Hsiu) E-mail: hhsiu@mail.ntust.edu.tw; (Chung-Hua Hsu) E-mail: owlherbs@yahoo.com.tw.

Abstract: This study tested the hypothesis that measuring and analyzing skin-surface blood flow dynamics can be used to noninvasively discriminate the different microcirculatory and physiological function states of breast-cancer patients with chemotherapy between receiving and not receiving Kuan-Sin-Yin (KSY) treatment. The 17 included patients were assigned randomly to 2 comparison groups: Group K (n = 10) received KSY treatment, while Group NK (n = 7) did not receive KSY treatment. Beat-to-beat, spectral, and approximate-entropy (ApEn) analyses were applied to the 20-minute laser-Doppler sequences. The self-reported quality of life and cancer-related symptoms of patients were also investigated. In posttests, Group NK had a significantly larger ApEn ratio than that in Group K, significantly smaller values of laser-Doppler-flowmetry variability indices, and a slightly higher relative energy contribution of the neural-related frequency band compared to those in the pretests. Almost all cancer-related symptoms showed improvements in Group K compared to in Group NK. The present findings indicated that the present analysis can be used to detect the significantly different responses in the laser-Doppler indices between taking and not taking KSY. The KSY effect was also noted to be accompanied with improvement of EORTC QLQ-C30 scores. These could lead to a rapid, inexpensive, and objective technique for enhancing clinical applications in quality-of-life monitoring of breast cancer therapy.

Keywords: Breast cancer, blood flow, laser Doppler, approximate entropy, spectral analysis

DOI: 10.3233/CH-190569

Journal: Clinical Hemorheology and Microcirculation, vol. 73, no. 4, pp. 553-563, 2019