These people also have trouble coping with the outside world, and are usually
locked away in hospitals for life on strong prescription of medications. These
do not solve their problems, whereas electroshock therapy can solve their
problems for life with side-effects lasting only six months at the most amount
of time. ECT can solve both these clinical conditions permanently, but there are
still those in society that look down upon ECT because of past rumors, and their
lack of up-to-date knowledge of this subject. Doctors seem to use ECT as a last
resort after contaminating patients’ bodies with drugs. Electroshock therapy is
not only a good idea, but in some cases a necessity. For example if there is a
person going through manic-depression this can be a very helpful cure.
Especially if this person may have suicidal tendencies. It also helps many
individuals who can not tolerate the standard medications prescribed for mental
illness. (Dabiri USA Today). A lot of medications used for depression and
schizophrenia such as prozac have terrible side effects and are being considered
to be taken off the pharmaceutical market. Prozac was first used in the 1930’s
in Italy and is still used, while temporary drugs(prozac, ritalin) will
eventually reach a downfall. The trend of depression has risen greatly in the
90’s and some people really do need such treatments as ECT to help. Electroshock
therapy is not a popular practice in the mental illness treatment field. Many
people still believe that it is barbaric and does not deserve a place in today’s
society.
People still have dark and gory images of ECT from such books as One
Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, where ECT was graphically portrayed as a grisly
machine that enhanced dementia. This is not necessarily true though, ECT is more
safe and effective than alternative drugs used to treat these symptoms can
become addictive and sometimes lethal, oh yes lethal! Maybe some day people will
see electroshock therapy not as a danger, but as a productive way to rid mental
illness. ECT may seem risky and dangerous at the time, but with science and
technological advances improving daily, this could be a miracle cure for
widespread mental illness that affects many different people all over the world.
Electroshock Therapy Electroshock therapy what is it? How does it work? What is
it used for and what comes from it? This paper will answer all of these
questions and will also try to prove that electroshock therapy is useful and not
as bad as it appears to be. Electroshock therapy is an old process of ridding
schizophrenia, and depression, and suicidal tendencies. It is used when people
with major depression are taking too many anti depressant drugs, can’t take the
side-effects of their medication, or they are taking too many drugs and
anti-depressant drugs are too risky to take. It is also used to irradiate
certain cases of schizophrenia and is being studied to treat dementia. (Mental
Illness Assessment and Treatment p.78).
Convulsive therapy using drugs rather than electricity was introduced in 1934
by Hungarian neuropsychiatrist Ladisles meduna , who speculated that seizures
(similar to the ones occurring in epilepsy) could probably alleviate mental
disorders. He based his theory on the belief that epileptic seizures prevented
the symptoms of schizophrenia. Although this was a good theory, the drugs
administered to the patients to induce these seizures was too risky to the
patients lives. In 1937 psychiatrists started using electric shocks to induce
seizures. In 1939 ECT was in wide use in the United States. In those days ECT
was unrefined and resulted in many complications and was terribly abused. Today
ECT is more refined, safe, and effective (Mental Illness Assessment and
Treatment p.78). How does it work? Electroshock therapy or ECT involves exposing
the brain to carefully controlled pulses of electric current that induce brief
seizures. The reason why electroshock therapy relieves depression is still
unknown. Researchers believe that Electroshock therapy alters monoamine
function, as do the anti-depressant drugs. The process of inducing seizures
through electroshock is not as complicated or as dangerous as people think. The
patient is placed in a specially equipped room, where a clinical team first
issues intravenous general anesthetic.
