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The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

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Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#21

Post by Hydraulix989 »

imperio59 wrote: post #7

The ECT industry is on par with the Purdue Pharmas of the world, they've lied about the terrible side effects of ECT, neglected to report to the FDA the side effects patients have experienced, and generally engaged in fraud and cover ups for the fact that ECT's purported "effectiveness" goes away once the treatments stop, while the very terrible side effects can be permanent, including amnesia, loss of motor function…

I can't believe this is actually a thing. Can't have depression if you don't have a functioning brain anymore, right? What are people thinking?!

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#22

Post by Hydraulix989 »

kristianp wrote: post #16

This is the most readable webpage I have seen for a while. The combination of background colour, black font, font face and line height make for an extremely readable page. Far better than the popular but varyingly unreadable white background and gray text. That ECT is still around after all this time, speaks to its effectiveness, despite some of the vehement comments on this page.

It's effective just like taking a hammer to your computer is when there is a bug in your code. You can't have a bug if you don't have a working computer.

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#23

Post by DanBC »

In England a patient who is detained under the act can be given medical treatment against their will, but the Mental Health Act includes an exemption for ECT that makes it much harder for doctors to provide ECT against a patient's wishes.

That information can be found in the Code of Practice to the Mental Health Act. The code isn't law, but it describes the various acts, statutes, and case law and so a health care practitioner would have to ahve good reason to deviate from it.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...

If you want to make it even harder for them to give you ECT against your wishes you can make an advance directive. Go see a lawyer that deals with mental capacity stuff and get one drawn up. Be clear and specific.

But, please do take note of what this woman has said:

> Despite the discomfort and the temporary memory loss it caused, I would have ECT again without hesitation. People voluntarily undergo much more invasive and damaging medical interventions to save or to prolong their lives—chemotherapy, radiation, open-heart surgery, blood transfusions, bone marrow transplants—and speak freely about those experiences, but continue to think about cancer and heart disease differently from mood disorders that can be equally deadly. In telling my own less than ideal story 30 years after the fact, I don’t want to discourage anyone from having this potentially life-saving treatment. What was difficult in my experience would now be unusual because the treatment protocol has improved over the years to greatly reduce the side effects. And my situation was extreme not only because of the perilous condition of my mind, but because my body was already hypersensitive and aggravated by drug allergies.

I know a few people who've had ECT and a couple of them hated it and are still angry it was done to them, but most of them are glad they had it done and would do it again.

It's hard to work out how much harm it causes because it's only used in people with the most severe depression, and that causes similar harms itself.

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#24

Post by throwaway1280 »

DanBC wrote: post #23

In England a patient who is detained under the act can be given medical treatment against their will, but the Mental Health Act includes an exemption for ECT that makes it much harder for doctors to provide ECT against a patient's wishes. That information can be found in the Code of Practice to the Mental Health Act. The code isn't law, but it describes the various acts, statutes, and case law and so a health care pr…

Yes, indeed.

I've had depression for nineteen years, and because of it I have giant holes in my memory - I know that I went places and did things when I was growing up, but I have next to no memories of any of them. My short-term memory malfunctions a lot - I can go through an entire day, and have zero memories of it the next day. I suspect I'd lose a few more memories with ECT but, really, I would happily pay those memories for having a life where I could actually function.

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#25

Post by phren0logy »

imperio59 wrote: post #7

The ECT industry is on par with the Purdue Pharmas of the world, they've lied about the terrible side effects of ECT, neglected to report to the FDA the side effects patients have experienced, and generally engaged in fraud and cover ups for the fact that ECT's purported "effectiveness" goes away once the treatments stop, while the very terrible side effects can be permanent, including amnesia, loss of motor function…

Is this a Scientology account?

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#26

Post by DanBC »

imperio59 wrote: post #5
Analemma_ wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment is dangerous and irresponsible. This is not the 40’s, ECT is not used lightly; it is the treatment of last resort for severe depression when lifestyle changes, medication and therapy have all failed. The side effects are well-understood and patients who choose ECT do so because the alternative is unbearable. What you are saying cashes out to the claim that depression can be overcome with sheer positivity…

Sorry but there are dozens of studies and hundreds of reports of people basically losing memories of entire portions of their life and the ability to do simple things like tie their shoelaces or do simple math after just one round of ECT. How this is still not banned by the FDA is beyond me. Not to mention the number of people who get heart complications from it or outright die during the procedure. How can you say t…

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21609510

> We conducted a systematic review and aimed to answer the following clinical questions: What are the effects of treatments in mild to moderate and severe depression, and in treatment-resistant depression? Which interventions reduce relapse rates? We searched: Medline, Embase, The Cochrane Library, and other important databases up to June 2009 (Clinical Evidence reviews are updated periodically, please check our website for the most up-to-date version of this review). We included harms alerts from relevant organisations such as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). RESULTS:

> We found 88 systematic reviews, RCTs, or observational studies that met our inclusion criteria. We performed a GRADE evaluation of the quality of evidence for interventions.

This meta analysis found that ECT was beneficial.

The point of ECT is not to act as a long lasting cure, it's to get someone out of a depressive episode so that they can engage in work to treat their depression - it's a life saving short term intervention that gives them time and space to do other work.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/the-british-journal-...

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#27

Post by nothanksmydude »

devoply wrote: post #6
Analemma_ wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment is dangerous and irresponsible. This is not the 40’s, ECT is not used lightly; it is the treatment of last resort for severe depression when lifestyle changes, medication and therapy have all failed. The side effects are well-understood and patients who choose ECT do so because the alternative is unbearable. What you are saying cashes out to the claim that depression can be overcome with sheer positivity…

Not particularly last resort. And apparently there is a large line-up in the system for people to get this therapy. They claim that there is a lot of efficacy... but apparently for many the symptoms return over time. The author of the article concludes: "Despite the discomfort and the temporary memory loss it caused, I would have ECT again without hesitation." Much of psychiatry to me seems like an infant mad science…

The long wait lines are because of pending malpractice lawsuits.

This practice is barbaric. It's legitimzed self harm.

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#28

Post by 8fingerlouie »

DanBC wrote: post #23

In England a patient who is detained under the act can be given medical treatment against their will, but the Mental Health Act includes an exemption for ECT that makes it much harder for doctors to provide ECT against a patient's wishes. That information can be found in the Code of Practice to the Mental Health Act. The code isn't law, but it describes the various acts, statutes, and case law and so a health care pr…

It's the same in Denmark.

They can force various antipsychotics down your throat like Olanzapine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olanzapine) or Quetiapine(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quetiapine), with serious side effects, but ECT which has very little known side effects, and has been studied quite intensely, cannot be forced.

My wife suffered a psychotic manic episode (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postpartum_psychosis) after the birth of our first child, the opposite of post partum depression, which happens in 1/1000 births.

I witnessed her on antipsycotics for a week while attempting to persuade her to accept ECT. The effects of ECT were astonishing. She had the ECT treatment at 9:00 in the morning, and by noon she was back to normal. She had a few more treatments after that to make sure she didn't relapse, and that was the last we saw of it.

She's still without relapses 10 years later, and according to her, should it happen again she would accept ECT much sooner.

Edit: I should probably elaborate on the side effects she experienced. She suffered short term memory loss, which is a known side effect. When she went to the ECT treatment she recognized the driver, and they established where they knew each other from. It was surreal to witness the same conversation unfold with the driver that just unfolded 20 minutes ago before ECT. She had absolutely no recollection of having seen or talked to the guy before on that day.

She feels (now) that she has lost more memory, but as the conventional treatment for manic episodes is basically locking them up in a room with a bed, a table a chair, and some sheets of paper, and keeping them confined there for 2+ weeks, i bet most of us would be unable to keep track of time. Add the various drugs being administered to the equation, in doses that makes you lean against the wall and drool.

She has no memory problems today. The only "blank spots" are in the time surrounding her hospitalization, specifically the days her ECT treatment was administered.

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#29

Post by candiodari »

nickbarnwell wrote: post #19
imperio59 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry but that's the equivalent of saying "This person is about to kill themselves, so let's take a bat and hit them over the head with it so they can't do that now. See, now they're doing fine, they're not killing themselves." Would you take someone who is about to kill themselves and take a pair of live electric wires to their head to try to "cure" them? Because that's essentially what ECT is, despite all the s…

There is a both a large and strong evidence base for the usage of ECT in cases of severe, treatment resistant depression. Many aspects of modern medicine can be made to sound barbaric with the right framing; those who disparage ECT are not so quick to characterise chemotherapy as “poison by any other name” or dialysis a “vampiric ball and chain”. By the time ECT is on the table, every other option is exhausted and th…

And yet from the article ...

"But he acquiesced when told that if he resisted, the hospital would seek a court order to overrule him."

Are you claiming they would do this, yet have the deeply depressed patient's honest agreement ?

I don't buy that. This was forced, under threat of force. To protect the hospital against having a successful suicide attempt on their record.

Symptoms return. Normal cognitive function does not. That tells you more than enough. This person is now (hopefully lightly) mentally handicapped, and this has been done to her under threat.

You might as well shoot the person. That has the same demonstrated effect. Seriously. Shooting someone with mental problems can fix those mental problems, many documented cases of that happening.

(edit: corrected language)

Re: The misunderstood consequences of electroconvulsive therapy

#30

Post by 8fingerlouie »

justtopost wrote: post #2

The most dangerous placebo. Please never allow yourself, or your loved ones to be subject to this. You have power within yourself.

Does it matter if it is a placebo if it works ?

I have personally witnessed a psychotic manic patient, who by her own account was _not_ sick, undergo treatment, and be completely free of mania and psychosis in 3-4 hours.

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