QEEG Brain Mapping
& Assessment
At The Togetherness Project, located in Hawthorn, Melbourne and Fremantle, South of Perth, Quantitative Electroencephalography (QEEG) is the foundation of everything we do in neurotherapy. Before we recommend any intervention, we want to know how your brain is actually functioning, not just what symptoms you are experiencing or what diagnosis you carry. A QEEG brain map gives us that picture, and it gives you one too.
QEEG is a non-invasive, radiation-free form of brain imaging that directly measures the electrical activity your brain produces every second of every day. That electrical activity, your brainwaves, contains a remarkable amount of information about how your nervous system is organised, where it is working efficiently, and where it may benefit from support.
The result is a personalised neurotherapy plan grounded in objective data rather than assumptions. This page explains what QEEG is, what the assessment involves, what we look for, and how the findings shape the care you receive.
What is QEEG?
QEEG stands for Quantitative Electroencephalography. It builds on clinical EEG, which has been used in medicine for nearly a century to monitor the electrical signals produced by the brain. What makes QEEG distinct is the addition of sophisticated mathematical analysis and comparison to a normative database.
During a QEEG assessment, sensors placed gently across the scalp pick up the tiny electrical signals generated by the coordinated firing of neurons. These signals are recorded as brainwave data across multiple frequency bands. Specialised software then compares your individual pattern of brainwave activity to a database of age-matched healthy individuals, producing a detailed map of where your brain's activity falls within or outside the typical range.
The output is a set of two-dimensional and three-dimensional brain maps that show areas of relative overactivity, underactivity, and dysregulation across different frequency bands and brain regions. These maps do not diagnose a condition. What they do is reveal the functional architecture of your nervous system in a way that no symptom checklist or clinical interview can.
QEEG has been a primary tool in neuroscience research for over five decades, with more than 1,500 peer-reviewed studies supporting its clinical and research applications across neurological, psychiatric, and developmental presentations.
How QEEG Differs from Other Brain Imaging
If you have previously had an MRI, CT scan, or clinical EEG, it is worth understanding what makes QEEG different and why those investigations and a QEEG can each contribute something the other cannot.
MRI and CT scans image the structure of the brain. They are excellent at detecting physical changes such as lesions, tumours, atrophy, or abnormalities in brain tissue. They tell us what the brain looks like. They do not tell us how it is working moment to moment.
QEEG measures function. It captures the real-time electrical behaviour of the brain in a way that structural imaging cannot. Two people can have structurally normal MRI scans and yet show very different patterns of brainwave activity. Equally, someone experiencing significant difficulties with attention, sleep, anxiety, or emotional regulation may have a completely normal structural MRI but a clearly dysregulated QEEG profile.
The table below summarises the key differences between QEEG and other commonly used neuroimaging modalities.
| Modality | What it measures | Function or structure | Radiation |
|---|---|---|---|
| QEEG | Electrical activity of the brain, measured directly at the scalp | Function | None |
| Clinical EEG | Electrical activity, reviewed visually without database comparison | Function | None |
| MRI | Tissue density and brain structure | Structure | None |
| CT | Tissue density via x-ray | Structure | Yes |
| fMRI | Blood oxygenation as an indirect measure of neural activity | Function | None |
| SPECT / PET | Blood flow or glucose metabolism via radioactive tracer | Function | Yes |
It is also worth distinguishing QEEG from standard clinical EEG. A clinical EEG is read visually by a neurologist and is primarily used to identify seizure activity or gross abnormalities. QEEG applies quantitative analysis and normative database comparison to the same recording technology, generating far more granular information about the functional organisation of the brain. Our assessments include automated screening for seizure and spike activity, and any findings that indicate the need for neurological review are referred appropriately.
What the Assessment Involves
A QEEG assessment at The Togetherness Project is straightforward, comfortable, and entirely non-invasive. There are no injections, no radiation, and nothing that enters the body. The recording itself is painless, though some people find the process of having the electrode cap fitted mildly unusual at first.
Before you arrive
To ensure your recording is as clean and accurate as possible, we ask that you arrive with freshly washed, dry hair and without conditioner, dry shampoo, hair spray, or other styling products. These products can interfere with the connection between the sensors and your scalp. We will walk you through any specific preparation instructions when you book.
The recording session
You will be seated comfortably in a chair. A soft electrode cap fitted with sensors is placed over your scalp. A small amount of conductive gel is applied to each sensor to improve the quality of the electrical signal. The gel is water soluble and washes out easily after the appointment.
Once the cap is fitted, the recording itself takes approximately 10 to 20 minutes. Depending on your assessment, recordings may be taken with your eyes open, your eyes closed, or both. During the recording you are simply sitting still and relaxed. There is nothing you need to do or think about.
For children or people who find it difficult to sit still for extended periods, we work flexibly to obtain a usable recording. If you have specific concerns about this, please let us know when you book so we can plan accordingly.
After the recording
The cap is removed after the recording. You will have some gel remaining in your hair, which washes out easily with warm water and shampoo. The full assessment appointment generally runs between 60 and 90 minutes, which includes time with your clinician before and after the recording.
Your QEEG data is then processed and analysed, and a detailed written report is produced. We walk you through the findings in a dedicated feedback appointment, explaining what the maps show in clear, accessible language. You receive a copy of the report to keep.
What We Look for in Your Brain Map
Your brain produces electrical activity at different frequencies simultaneously. These frequency bands each reflect different aspects of how your nervous system is operating. The bands we analyse include:
• Delta (1 to 4 Hz): The slowest frequency, most prominent during deep sleep. In waking recordings, excess delta in specific regions can indicate areas of reduced cortical engagement.
• Theta (4 to 8 Hz): Associated with internally directed cognition, memory consolidation, and drowsiness. Elevated theta in frontal regions is frequently seen in presentations involving attention and processing speed.
• Alpha (8 to 12 Hz): A foundational rhythm of calm, resting wakefulness and cortical idling. Alpha patterns reflect the brain's capacity to regulate arousal and shift flexibly between engagement and rest.
• Beta (12 to 22 Hz): Associated with active thinking, focused attention, and cognitive processing. Both excess and insufficient beta carry clinical relevance depending on the region and sub-band involved.
• High Beta (23 to 30 Hz): Often associated with elevated arousal, muscle tension, anxious thinking, and nervous system activation. Particularly informative in presentations involving anxiety and chronic stress.
• Gamma (above 30 Hz): Linked to high-level cognitive processing, sensory binding, and information integration across distributed brain regions.
We examine not only the power within each frequency band at individual electrode sites, but also the relationships between different regions of the brain. This connectivity analysis tells us whether different parts of the brain are communicating efficiently with one another and whether that communication is proportionate to what would be expected for someone your age.
Brain Networks and Why They Matter
The brain does not operate as a collection of isolated regions each performing a single task. Complex functions such as attention, emotional regulation, language, memory, and social awareness emerge from networks of regions working together in coordinated patterns. Understanding which networks are involved in your presentation is central to how we design your neurotherapy programme.
Some of the networks we assess and consider include:
The Default Mode Network
Active when the mind is at rest rather than engaged in an external task. This network underpins self-referential thinking, mind-wandering, autobiographical memory, and mentalising about others. Dysregulation here is relevant to presentations involving rumination, dissociation, difficulties with sense of self, and social cognition.
The Central Executive Network
Responsible for directing focused, goal-oriented behaviour. This network supports working memory, cognitive flexibility, decision-making, and the ability to plan and execute complex actions. Underactivity or inefficiency here is often seen in presentations involving executive functioning difficulties.
The Salience Network
Acts as a switchboard between the default mode and central executive networks. It determines what deserves attention and coordinates the shift between internally and externally directed thinking. When this network is dysregulated, the brain can struggle to filter what matters, contributing to overwhelm, hypervigilance, and difficulties with transitions.
The Limbic Network
Central to emotional processing, motivation, memory encoding, and the integration of bodily states with felt experience. This network has strong relevance to presentations involving chronic stress, adverse life experiences, attachment-related nervous system patterns, and emotional regulation difficulties.
The Sensorimotor Network
Governs the integration of sensory input and motor output. Relevant to presentations involving sensory processing differences, body awareness, coordination, and nervous system regulation through movement and interoception.
Attention Networks
The brain uses at least two distinct attention systems. The Dorsal Attention Network supports voluntary, goal-directed attention. The Ventral Attention Network supports reflexive, bottom-up attention, automatically redirecting focus when something unexpected or significant occurs. Both are relevant to understanding difficulties with sustained attention, distractibility, and attentional flexibility.
Your QEEG show us the patterns we observe across these and other relevant networks, and explain how those patterns connect to what you are experiencing in daily life
Event-Related Potentials
In addition to resting QEEG recording, some assessments include Event-Related Potentials (ERPs). ERPs capture how your brain responds to specific stimuli such as sounds or visual cues, and provide information about the speed, efficiency, and accuracy of your cognitive processing.
ERP components measure how quickly and effectively different stages of information processing occur, from the earliest sensory detection of a stimulus through to higher-order cognitive evaluation and response. These measures provide valuable information about auditory and cognitive processing speed, attention, and working memory capacity that complements the resting QEEG findings.
Heart Rate Variability
At The Togetherness Project, we often include Heart Rate Variability (HRV) measurement alongside QEEG as part of a comprehensive assessment of nervous system function. HRV measures the variation in time between consecutive heartbeats and is a sensitive indicator of autonomic nervous system regulation, the balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic branches of your nervous system.
Low HRV is associated with chronic stress, reduced vagal tone, and diminished capacity for flexible physiological response. Understanding your autonomic profile alongside your brainwave profile gives us a more complete picture of your nervous system as an integrated system, and informs the design of a protocol that addresses both brain-level and body-level regulation.
What Happens Next
Following your assessment, you receive a narrative explanation of the key findings, and a personalised neurotherapy protocol developed specifically from your data.
The personalised neurotherapy protocol outlines the specific neuromodulation approaches recommended based on your QEEG and associated findings. Depending on your profile, this may include one or more of the following modalities available at The Togetherness Project:
• Transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS)
• Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS)
• Transcranial random noise stimulation (tRNS)
• Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy (pEMF)
• Transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation (tVNS)
• Photobiomodulation (PBM) - Red, Near Infrared, Green and Violet light laser
Your protocol will specify the brain regions targeted, the parameters used, the rationale for each recommended modality, and a phased treatment structure across foundation, consolidation, stabilisation, and maintenance stages.
For clients also engaged in therapy at The Togetherness Project, the neurotherapy protocol is integrated with the relational and systemic work, so that nervous system-level support and therapeutic conversation are working in the same direction.
Who Can Benefit from QEEG Assessment?
QEEG assessment is appropriate across a wide age range and does not require a specific diagnosis. Many clients come to us having been through extensive diagnostic processes without finding an approach that addressed the complexity of what they were experiencing. Others come without any formal diagnosis, simply knowing that their nervous system does not feel regulated or that they are not functioning at the level they are capable of.
QEEG can provide useful information for people experiencing difficulties across a wide range of presentations, including:
• Anxiety, chronic stress, and nervous system dysregulation
• Low mood and difficulties with motivation and energy
• Sleep difficulties
• Emotional regulation challenges
• Sensory processing differences
• Learning and cognitive processing differences
• Neurodevelopmental presentations including autism
• Recovery following acquired brain injury, concussion, or neurological illness
• Chronic pain and somatic presentations with a nervous system component
• Eating disorders and disordered eating, where nervous system dysregulation is a maintaining factor
QEEG is also used by clients who are not seeking support for a specific difficulty but want an objective baseline of their brain function, either to optimise performance and wellbeing or to establish a reference point for monitoring change over time.
At The Togetherness Project, we do not require a diagnosis to begin. We start with your brain, your nervous system, and your goals.
Information for Referring Health Professionals
We welcome referrals from GPs, psychiatrists, psychologists, and allied health professionals. If you are considering a QEEG assessment for a client, we are happy to discuss suitability before a referral is made.
Reports are comprehensive and written to a standard suitable for inclusion in health records or sharing with other treating professionals. If a formal written medical report for medicolegal or third-party purposes is required, please discuss this at the time of referral as this is a separate service.
We recognise that QEEG sits outside the experience of many clinicians trained in traditional diagnostic frameworks. If you would like more information about what QEEG can and cannot contribute to clinical decision-making for your client, we encourage you to contact us directly. We are committed to working collaboratively with the broader treating team.
For clients who present with findings that indicate a need for neurological review, including screened seizure or spike activity, we facilitate appropriate onward referral. QEEG assessment at The Togetherness Project is not a diagnostic tool for epilepsy or structural neurological conditions, and we communicate clearly when findings suggest the need for further investigation outside our scope.
Getting Started
QEEG brain mapping is available at our clinics in Hawthorn, Melbourne and Fremantle, South of Perth. We offer a free 15-minute discovery call, or you are welcome to call us on our mobile. If you are unsure whether a QEEG assessment is the right starting point for you or your family member, reach out and we will help you work that out.
We understand that beginning any assessment process takes courage. Our aim is to make the experience as clear, comfortable, and genuinely useful as possible, so that you leave with something concrete: an understanding of your own brain and a plan built around it.
