Maintenance ECT

ECT is a highly stigmatised treatment which is often seen as immoral. It is however a treatment which is not painful or damaging. It involves an anaesthetic, administering a muscle relaxant and a seizure triggered by electrodes which are placed on a persons head. For the majority of the treatment, I’m asleep and oblivious to everything that is happening and simply wake up in recovery a little tired, but overall fine.

I’ve written before about ECT and I’ve now had so many treatments that I’ve lost count. This is not the typical treatment for most people, but for me, maintenance ECT has been the only thing to make any difference at all. Studies have shown that maintenance ECT after an initial response to ECT can be used to prevent relapse in people with severe treatment resistant depression.

I now have ECT once a week on an outpatient basis and it helps more than anything else ever has.

My apologies if the quote from the Sherlock Holmes television series is difficult for you in anyway at all. However for me going through this so frequently is a relief and a humorous thing to get me through my times in hospital. Especially when they keep handing me blankets! (and my love for Sherlock Holmes & Benedict Cumberbatch!) and there it shouldn’t be hidden, ECT is an electrical charge to the brain to induce a seizure, but when appropriate it can help so so much.