When did they start using electric shock to treat insanity?
A 1940 New York Times article with the headline “Insanity Treated by Electric Shock” described the treatment as “safer than injections” and “less expensive and less disagreeable.” Over time, doctors learned that it was more useful for people with other types of illnesses — like severe depression that didn’t respond to other forms of treatment.
Who invented the electric shock?
The electric shock, the article said, “is produced by a small portable electric box which was invented in Italy by Professor Ugo Cerletti of the Rome University Clinic.” Dr. S. Eugene Barrera, the principal researcher on the project, “emphasized that hope for any ‘miracle cure’ must not be pinned on the new method.”
Is the fight over electric shock treatment over?
A decades-long fight over an electric shock treatment led to an FDA ban. But the fight is far from over. “What they’re doing is just taking people that have issues and just building more,” said Rico Torres, who was first shocked at eight years old.
How often are women subjected to electroshock therapy?
“Women are subjected to electroshock 2 to 3 times as often as men,” note s Bonnie Burstow. There is no controversy that women are far likelier to receive ECT treatment than men.
Why did they give electric shock treatment?
Why it's done. Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) can provide rapid, significant improvements in severe symptoms of several mental health conditions. ECT is used to treat: Severe depression, particularly when accompanied by detachment from reality (psychosis), a desire to commit suicide or refusal to eat.
When did shock therapy start?
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is used to treat patients with certain types of mental illness, including severe depression, severe mania, and catatonia. It was first developed in the late 1930s, with the first recorded treatments at McLean Hospital taking place in 1941.
When did they stop giving electric shock therapy?
The use of ECT declined until the 1980s, "when use began to increase amid growing awareness of its benefits and cost-effectiveness for treating severe depression".
What was insulin shock therapy in the 1930s?
Insulin shock therapy or insulin coma therapy was a form of psychiatric treatment in which patients were repeatedly injected with large doses of insulin in order to produce daily comas over several weeks.
How was depression treated in the 1930s?
In the 1930s, mental illness treatments were in their infancy and convulsions, comas and fever (induced by electroshock, camphor, insulin and malaria injections) were common. Other treatments included removing parts of the brain (lobotomies).
Do they still do electric shock therapy?
But electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is still being used -- more in Europe than the United States -- and it may be the most effective short-term treatment for some patients with depressive symptoms, a newly published review in the journal The Lancet suggests.
Why is ECT so controversial?
Reasons for Controversy Three reasons are given for the aversion: 1) ECT is considered old-fashioned and politically incorrect; 2) it is forced on the patient; and 3) the memory disturbances are so severe and persistent that no rational human being would undergo this procedure, no matter how well-intended.
What mental illness does ECT treat?
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is a medical treatment most commonly used in patients with severe major depression or bipolar disorder that has not responded to other treatments.
Why is ECT used for depression?
With ECT, an electrical stimulation is delivered to the brain and causes a seizure. For reasons that doctors don't completely understand, this seizure helps relieve the symptoms of depression. ECT does not cause any structural damage to the brain.
What disorders were commonly treated with insulin-shock treatment?
Until the discovery of the tranquilizing drugs, variations of insulin-shock therapy (also called insulin-coma therapy) were commonly used in the treatment of schizophrenia and other psychotic conditions.
Is ECT a lobotomy?
In the mid-20th century, the lobotomy was a popular “cure” for mental illness. It was part of a new wave of treatments for neurological diseases, including electroconvulsive therapy (ECT).
Why did psychiatrists abandon ECT?
Psychiatry has long abandoned studying ECT utilizing a placebo-control, no doubt because in the past such methodology showed ECT to be ineffective. Download. Prior to 1986, there were 10 placebo-controlled experiments done on ECT use on depressed patients.
Who spoke out against ECT?
One renowned feminist who did speak out against ECT was Kate Millett (author of the 1990 book Loony Bin Trip ), ...
How many volts does an ECT take?
The standard “electrical dosage” is from 100 to 190 volts but can rise to 450 volts. Thus, while ECT no longer appears quite as torturous to observers as it appeared prior to these procedure changes, ECT’s effects on the brain are as—or more—damaging than ever.
How much voltage is needed for a seizure?
The standard “electrical dosage” is from 100 to 190 volts but can rise to 450 volts.
Is ECT a placebo control?
While psychiatry quotes studies stating a high percentage of patients improved with ECT, lacking a placebo-control, these studies are scientifically meaningless. A significant number of patients with depression will report improving with any kind of treatment. Much of the effectiveness of any depression treatment has to do with faith, belief, ...
Is ECT treatment for women or men?
There is no controversy that women are far likelier to receive ECT treatment than men. The 2016 Texas report noted females received 68% of the ECT treatments. While men too are treated with ECT, similar to the statistics on sexual abuse, men receive ECT at a much lower rate. With respect to age, Texas reported that 61% of those who received ECT ...
Is ECT more common in the Northeast or the West?
There is wide variation of ECT use within the United States, as the journal Brain and Behavior reported in 2012 that, among the Medicare population in the United States, ECT treatments were twice as common in urban areas as in rural areas, and ECT was more common in the Northeast than the West.
What were the treatments for mental illness in the 1930s?
The use of certain treatments for mental illness changed with every medical advance. Although hydrotherapy, metrazol convulsion, and insulin shock therapy were popular in the 1930s, these methods gave way to psychotherapy in the 1940s. By the 1950s, doctors favored artificial fever therapy and electroshock therapy.
Why did mental hospitals use hydrotherapy?
Exposing patients to baths or showers of warm water for an extended period of time often had a calming effect on them. For this reason, mental hospitals used hydrotherapy as a tool for treating mental illness. Patients in steam cabinets, c 1910. American Psychiatric Association Archives.
What is electro shock therapy?
Electroshock therapy, also known as electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), is a treatment for severe major depression, bipolar depression, and other mental health conditions. Psychiatrists may recommend ECT when a person does not respond well to other treatments. ECT uses electric currents to stimulate a person’s brain to induce a controlled seizure.
Why is ECT negative?
The negative perceptions of ECT originate from previous misuse and the historical lack of consistent administration of general anesthetics or muscle relaxants. Furthermore, when healthcare professionals first introduced ECT, many people did not consent to the therapy.
Why was the VNS developed?
Researchers originally developed VNS to treat seizure conditions. However, they realized that it was also an effective treatment#N#Trusted Source#N#for depression. Before stimulating the vagus nerve, a doctor places an electrode under the skin of a person’s chest.
How does ECT work?
ECT uses electric currents to stimulate a person’s brain to induce a controlled seizure. Researchers do not exactly know how ECT works, but one theory is that it could regulate neurotransmitter activity. This article looks at how ECT works, whether it is an effective treatment, and its controversial history. It also discusses some alternative ...
How long does an ECT last?
An ECT session may last for about 1 hour, which includes 15–20 minutes for the procedure and 20–30 minutes of recovery time. A person may receive ECT two or three times a week for a total of between six and 12 sessions. The frequency and number of sessions will differ among individuals depending on the severity of the condition and ...
Why do doctors recommend ECT?
However, doctors recommend ECT for some people because it is low risk and carries few side effects. Researchers are still not sure how ECT works, but they understand that it has many effects on the brain, including increasing blood flow and triggering the release of neurotransmitters and hormones.
Is ECT a negative thing?
The media has tended to portray ECT in a negative light — for example, in the film version of “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”. However, attitudes toward ECT are changing, and people are beginning to view it as an effective treatment for those with mental health conditions that are resistant to medication and therapy.
When is ECT administered?
Promotional materials are careful in describing the procedure and present a picture that’s quite benign: “ECT treatment is generally administered in the morning, before breakfast,” reads one brochure. “Prior to the actual treatment, the patient is given general anesthesia and a muscle relaxant.
Why did terror stalk the halls of euthanasia hospitals?
According to history professor Henry Friedlander, “Terror stalked the halls of the euthanasia hospitals not only because patients feared being selected for killing at any time or because some of the staff beat and maltreated them, but also because some medical procedures imposed unusual pain.”.
Why do we use higher voltages in the brain?
Much higher voltages are employed in the modern procedure because muscle relaxants and anesthetics raise the seizure threshold, with more electricity required to produce a seizure. The greater heat and electricity themselves cause more brain cell death, he says.
What machines were used in the Moroccan prison system?
The center also had several Page-Russell electroshock machines, which were routinely used on prisoners. During the post-shock periods, Moroccan physicians questioned the detainees, seeking information about opponents to the king.”.
What is the brief convulsion?
That “brief convulsion” is the body’s physical reaction to the brain-damaging seizure induced by the electric current applied to the lobes.
Does electric current cause seizures?
While the modern procedure is generally carried out without busted teeth and the more grisly features of its early practice, the principle is still the same: Electric current blazes through the brain to provoke a seizure—the logic being that seizures occurring in the brain have some therapeutic benefit, somehow.
Does electricity shock the brain?
And Baughman says using electricity to shock the brain into a seizure—no matter how you do it—results in real and lasting harm. “You are creating a seizure which is prima facie evidence of brain damage,” he observes.
When was the Electroconvulsive Therapy Machine invented?
The conflicts over ECT have other sources. Electroconvulsive Therapy Machine 1945-60. Credit: Science Museum, London Wellcome Images (CC BY 4.0) ECT was invented in Italy in the late 1930s. Psychiatrists had already discovered that inducing seizures could relieve symptoms of mental illness.
Why was ECT used in mental hospitals?
There is no question that ECT was benefiting patients then, but there is also a lot of evidence from that period showing that ECT, and the threat of it, were used in mental hospitals to control difficult patients and to maintain order on wards. ECT was also physically dangerous when first developed.
What treatment did Leia Organa use?
Fisher’s bravery, though, was not just in fighting the stigma of her illness, but also in declaring in her memoir “ Shockaholic ” her voluntary use of a stigmatized treatment: electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), often known as shock treatment.
How does ECT work?
ECT works by using electricity to induce seizures. This is certainly a counterintuitive way of treating illness. But many medical treatments, such as chemotherapy for cancer, require us to undergo terrible physical experiences for therapeutic purposes. The conflicts over ECT have other sources.
What was the power of ECT?
Kesey, though, would also have known about ECT’s power to relieve symptoms of mental illness, and one of the characters in the book attests to this. At that time, ECT was also used as a “treatment” for homosexuality, then considered by psychiatrists to be an illness.
How many people receive ECT?
Increasingly, ECT came to be provided with consent, and the use of modified ECT became standard. Now, psychiatrists estimate that about 100,000 Americans receive ECT. With the rise of the age of Prozac, our culture became more comfortable with physical fixes for those illnesses we continue to call “mental.”.
When did ECT use decline?
ECT use declined in the 1960s and 1970s, but revived starting in the early 1980s. During the years since, there have been a growing number of positive portrayals, often in patient memoirs like Fisher’s.
Who invented the electric shock?
The electric shock, the article said, “is produced by a small portable electric box which was invented in Italy by Professor Ugo Cerletti of the Rome University Clinic.”. Dr. S. Eugene Barrera, the principal researcher on the project, “emphasized that hope for any ‘miracle cure’ must not be pinned on the new method.”.
What is ECT therapy?
The article described “a new method, introduced in Italy, of treating certain types of mental disorders by sending an electric shock through the brain.”. It was the first time that what is now called electroconvulsive therapy, or ECT, had been mentioned in The Times. The electric shock, the article said, “is produced by a small portable electric ...