“What is the sense of ruining my head and erasing my memory, which is my capital, and putting me out of business? It was a brilliant cure but we lost the patient.” Nobel prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway, excerpted from his suicide note following ECT.
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), is a psychiatric procedure, also referred to as electroshock treatment or shock treatment. It involves the use of high-voltage electricity that is forced through the human brain to produce a grand mal seizure.
Psychiatrists claim the procedure will ‘reset’ or ‘reboot’ the brain, but it’s a theory that has never been proven. There is however considerable evidence that ECT causes significant and irreversible brain damage. The human brain is a highly intricate organ, controlling the body with more than five trillion signals every second. It performs these functions with nearly eight times less than the power of a watch battery. One ECT session however targets the brain with 2,300 times more electricity than it needs to function, leading to severe trauma.
ECT was initially delivered without anaesthesia. As a result, patients would suffer broken teeth, jaws and spines from the muscular spasms induced by the electricity. It was then ‘modernised’ and marketed as ‘new and improved.’ The procedure was coupled with anaesthetics and paralysing agents that acted to obscure a patients’ convulsions and screams.
Although the procedure looked more acceptable, it was more dangerous than ever. The anaesthesia and paralysing drugs raised the seizure threshold, requiring much more electricity to induce a seizure. The result remains the same: a grand mal seizure and brain damage, which can be permanent.
Most psychiatrists are uneducated on the laws of electricity. Since each patient is different, the amount of electricity needed to induce a seizure is also different. Many tries, and many additional shocks may be needed, each one carrying with it brain and organ damage. It’s trial and error where the patient is the guinea pig.
In order to deflect responsibility for the harm being inflicted, psychiatrists blame a patient’s ‘underlying mental illness.’ But they have difficulty explaining away the collateral damage to the rest of the body, like abnormal heart rhythms, heart attacks and stroke.
There are the physical after-effects of ECT; brain trauma, memory loss and organ damage. There are also the psychological after-effects. The sudden and permanent inability to remember how to do simple tasks, an inability to recall the names of best friends, children or spouses, not to mention recalling one’s life before ECT, can all be devastating.
There are 109 ECT clinics located in England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Ireland. The Royal College of Psychiatrists administrates the ECT Accreditation Service (ECTAS), which comprises a tick-box process to determine whether all of the necessary equipment is present and that the location adheres to the ECTAS expectations. It doesn’t however address the potential for brain damage and other physical and psychological harm that can occur as a result of the procedure.
A documentary has been produced by CCHR titled Therapy or Torture – The Truth About Electroshock. As the title suggests, it tells the truth about electroshock.
If you or anyone you know has suffered as a result of ECT, you can report the experience by clicking on the following ‘REPORT ECT’ link.