It sounds like the use of electroshock therapy is fading out as newer and more potent psych drugs come on the market. Who would want to risk losing their memory?

It is used very rarely these days. I think someone has to be near catatonic with depression or extremely violent to have ECT performed on them. What's surprising is that frontal lobotomies are still performed in extreme, extreme cases (I think the number is in the hundreds per year). Despite all of our medications and behavioral modifications, in some cases these seemingly barbaric procedures are the only thing keeping people alive and/or functional.

@ david wayne osedach:

I've had ECT just once and my memory loss was confined to a rather well-defined time period. An unusually severe manic phase of my bipolar condition had tipped over into psychosis and, in common with the other three psychotic episodes I have experienced, my memory of events during that psychotic state is crystal clear even years later. The last thing I remember at the hospital was being asked to change into pajamas. The next thing I remember was being discharged two or three days later in a state of confusion but no longer psychotic or even manic. My memory loss was confined to the hospitalization period.

What ill-informed or biased critics of ECT don't mention is that the alternative drug therapies are not problem-free either. For many people these alternatives are simply less effective or not effective at all. For many people a clinically effective dose is too toxic for their liver. And for many people side effects on the mind are intolerable. I was once prescribed Haldol and experienced a side-effect called akathesia, a feeling of intense restlessness that has been aptly termed "chemical torture". But in my case an effective combination of drugs has proven, by trial and error, to be effective and I regard ECT as a stop-gap measure or last resort.

jeneria:

It is used very rarely these days. I think someone has to be near catatonic with depression or extremely violent to have ECT performed on them. What's surprising is that frontal lobotomies are still performed in extreme, extreme cases (I think the number is in the hundreds per year). Despite all of our medications and behavioral modifications, in some cases these seemingly barbaric procedures are the only thing keeping people alive and/or functional.

Really? You honestly are asserting to the readers here that a lobotomy has kept somebody alive? It's a life saving treatment now is it?

It's only 'seemingly barbaric' or are you only 'seemingly barbaric' in your approach to the human rights of others?

pwoxby:

@ david wayne osedach:

I've had ECT just once and my memory loss was confined to a rather well-defined time period. An unusually severe manic phase of my bipolar condition had tipped over into psychosis and, in common with the other three psychotic episodes I have experienced, my memory of events during that psychotic state is crystal clear even years later. The last thing I remember at the hospital was being asked to change into pajamas. The next thing I remember was being discharged two or three days later in a state of confusion but no longer psychotic or even manic. My memory loss was confined to the hospitalization period.

What ill-informed or biased critics of ECT don't mention is that the alternative drug therapies are not problem-free either. For many people these alternatives are simply less effective or not effective at all. For many people a clinically effective dose is too toxic for their liver. And for many people side effects on the mind are intolerable. I was once prescribed Haldol and experienced a side-effect called akathesia, a feeling of intense restlessness that has been aptly termed "chemical torture". But in my case an effective combination of drugs has proven, by trial and error, to be effective and I regard ECT as a stop-gap measure or last resort.

Of course, it's completely impossible that your psychotic episodes were caused by the psych drugs you were on now isn't it?

We have someone above, who admittedly has drugged his brain with myriad toxic mind altering drugs, and shocked it, and he puts his behavioral problems down to 'nature'... sounds a little like the man made pillar to post your brain has had with drugs and shock, could be your problem. Given there is zero evidence you have a diseased brain, as no biological test was ever taken on your brain, and there is ample evidence you've been pumping drugs and electricity into it for years, I find it very strange you're so convinced of the etiology of your distress.

"Of course, it's completely impossible that your psychotic episodes were caused by the psych drugs you were on now isn't it?"

Yes, that is completely impossible. I was not on drugs of any kind when the first psychotic episode occurred. Furthermore, the factor that does link my psychotic episodes is stress. The human brain did not evolve to cope well with constant stress; instead we have a natural fight or flight response.

"We have someone above, who admittedly has drugged his brain with myriad toxic mind altering drugs, and shocked it,..."

It sure sounds like you have an ax to grind. Care to tell us about it?

"... there is ample evidence you've been pumping drugs and electricity into it for years,..."

More wild hyperbole. As for the ECT, try reading what I actually wrote.

"I find it very strange you're so convinced of the etiology of your distress."

A bizarre statement since I didn't mention "the etiology of [my] distress". "Bipolar mood disorder" is a description of symptoms, not a cause of symptoms.

So stress caused your first psychosis and you've been screwing with your brain ever since with drugs.... so stress and drugs caused your psychoses possibly, so it is not 'impossible' as you seem to think,

Furthermore, you seem to think what your 'stressed' 'non evolved' brain needed, was more stress, the stress of drugs coursing through it. Now that, my friend, is the bizarre thing here.

jalaepnocurse:

So stress caused your first psychosis and you've been screwing with your brain ever since with drugs.... so stress and drugs caused your psychoses possibly, so it is not 'impossible' as you seem to think,

Stress can trigger bi-polar episodes, but the cause is physical. In fact, in may cases it may be caused by sub-clinical deep-brain temperal lobe epilepsy (many of the drugs that are effective for bi-polar are also used for epilepsy). Of course, it sounds completely non-intuitive that an mechanically-induced seizure (E.C.T.) could be used to treat a seizure disorder. However, I have heard of E.C.T. being used to successfully bring a person out of status-epilepticus (a seizure that is potentially deadly because it simply won't stop).

@ jalaepnocurse:

I still don't understand why you are so insistent on reversing causality with your unsubstantiated claim that the treatment causes the illness. I have met other bipolar individuals and none of them were taking psychopharmaceuticals prior to the onset of their illness. And physicians tend not to prescribe psychopharmaceuticals to people with no history of mental illness.

Nor do I understand why you continue with the wild hyperbole like "you've been screwing with your brain ever since with drugs". This really has no place in a rational discussion. It's not as if I'm some junkie getting high on heroin or that I'm sticking a knife blade into electrical outlets to induce seizures. My treatment has always been under the supervised care of a responsible physician.

Jalapeno... or whatever - you know, my friend, you sound like a smart and well balanced person. You really ought to consider getting into 00-guage model railways. It might take your mind off this stuff, as you clearly obsess about it, in a way that is definitely not helping you, and is leading you to make utterly ignorant pronoucements that might actually harm someone else.

Whatever you do, however, do steer clear of those free personality tests from scientologists. You absolutely will not be helped by anything to do with dead aliens or e-meters.

Have a nice day.

"I still don't understand why you are so insistent on reversing causality with your unsubstantiated claim that the treatment causes the illness. I have met other bipolar individuals and none of them were taking psychopharmaceuticals prior to the onset of their illness."

What you elect, without any biological test at all, to label, 'the onset of their illness', is a period you previously referred to as often one of great life stressors. You neglect to read I did not in my previous post to you, claim that all first periods of distress you choose to label 'onset' where caused by psychiatric mind altering drugs. They could in fact be caused by illicit drugs. Or just the stress alone. The subsequent 'episodes' in your story can be explained by many things.... including the psychiatric drugs themselves, or simply the stress of believing you now have a 'lifelong brain disease'.... it's interesting that it is always the 'onset', or read, the start of a long story, is it impossible you've been indoctrinated into a life of fear and terror, fearing your brain, blaming your brain, 'expecting' things to go wrong, pathologizing your every mood thought and day on earth, when if a shrink elected to label you with a different label, perhaps just a brief label, not a lifelong one, you would never have had the subsequent periods of extreme distress/psychoses?? of course it is.

"Nor do I understand why you continue with the wild hyperbole like "you've been screwing with your brain ever since with drugs". This really has no place in a rational discussion. It's not as if I'm some junkie getting high on heroin or that I'm sticking a knife blade into electrical outlets to induce seizures."

You are, someone who is taking, on an ongoing basis, drugs, that perturb your neurology, alter your brain, on the basis of zero evidence you have a diseased brain, nobody has ever examined your brain on the biological level at all, and you also, take these drugs on the understanding the no biological investigation is taking place to adjust the doses of the drugs, merely guesswork, and you do so on the understanding that your distress and problems in life are merely 'believed to be caused by a chemical imbalance'.... you don't demand evidence, measurement, in the diagnosis of the imbalance, nor the selection of dosage of synthetic chemicals to be added to it. You are even now, under the influence of mind altering, cognitive function diminishing drugs.... the guesswork and wishful thinking you're engaged in, the faith based ideology, you might as well be shooting herion and calling it 'treatment' for the 'despair brain disease' caused when your girlfriend left you, that you diagnosed just by 'observing your behavior for ten minutes'.... to merely explain away the way you've chosen to live the label, allow your body, identity, and future, present and past, to be colonized by psychiatric ideology, by using the blanket phrase 'responsible physician'... is not going to fly with me.... and you need to learn, once and for all, that it won't fly with everybody, and you will come across people who are not as brainwashed and drugged as you, whether you like it or not.

"My treatment has always been under the supervised care of a responsible physician"

Geez, you actually talk as though you're seeiing a real doctor, for a real disease. You better be sure, wouldn't want to have even a little seed of doubt in your mind you haven't been taken for a ride..... would you now?

NickBongo, or 'whatever', you know.... you know what pal, I'm not going anywhere. Your miserable failure to engage on the facts, and your blanket smearing aside, you're the one who makes ignorant pronouncements that harm. And your bringing up of some kind of cult you have zero evidence I have anything to do with? Shows your aim, more to the point, abilities, have only ever stretched to pathetic character assassination. You have the nice day, as I'm sure your days are filled with so much original thought. After that dismal attempt at engaging me, nothing further labeled from you will be responded to... goodnight sunshine.

@ jalaepnocurse:

"...without any biological test at all..." "...nobody has ever examined your brain on the biological level at all..." "...no biological investigation is taking place..."

Are you suggesting that my brain be thin-sectioned and examined under a microscope? I hope you'll understand if I pass on that idea. When I was first hospitalized with psychosis (and when did psychosis become a common reaction to stress?), diagnostic imaging of my brain was done. So your presumption that you know more about my medical history than I do is simply arrogant.

"...you don't demand evidence, measurement, in the diagnosis of the imbalance, nor the selection of dosage of synthetic chemicals to be added to it."

More arrogant presumption. Like many or even most people diagnosed with mental illness, I was reluctant to accept the diagnosis. This is contrary to your insulting suggestion that I was easily "indoctrinated". I was sufficiently demanding of evidence that I performed the logical experiment and discontinued the treatment. That experiment provided the evidence I needed.

"...[you have] zero evidence you have a diseased brain..."

Can I overuse the words "arrogant presumption"? I am a better judge of the state of my own mind now and in the past than you are. Have you ever experienced psychosis? I can say from personal experience that it is not characteristic of a normally functioning brain. And what, exactly, is your personal experience in this matter? Thought so.

"You are even now, under the influence of mind altering, cognitive function diminishing drugs.... the guesswork and wishful thinking you're engaged in, the faith based ideology, you might as well be shooting herion and calling it 'treatment' for the 'despair brain disease' caused when your girlfriend left you, that you diagnosed just by 'observing your behavior for ten minutes'.... to merely explain away the way you've chosen to live the label, allow your body, identity, and future, present and past, to be colonized by psychiatric ideology, by using the blanket phrase 'responsible physician'... is not going to fly with me.... and you need to learn, once and for all, that it won't fly with everybody, and you will come across people who are not as brainwashed and drugged as you, whether you like it or not."

As a connoisseur of irony, let me note that you comment on my cognitive function in an incoherent, rambling mess of a run-on sentence. (What girlfriend left me?!?) If I may tease a coherent thought from that sentence, you seem to be saying that the pharmaceutical treatment for my bipolar mood disorder renders me unfit to assess the efficacy of that treatment. Without knowing what that specific treatment is, is your opinion based on anything more than arrogant presumption?