Neuropathic motor unit abnormalities revealed by surface-detected electromyography decomposition

We investigated whether surface-detected motor unit action potential (MUAP) shapes can be used to identify alterations in muscle control that occur in neuropathy and that are typically assessed using invasive needle electromyography (EMG). We found that a novel, non-invasive MUAP extraction technique was able to detect the presence of MUAPs with abnormally large sizes during low force contractions in our patient group, consistently with needle EMG findings from the literature, and to discriminate control from neuropathic populations.