About Electro Shock Treatment

I am opposed to Electro Shock Treatment. I want to see it banned on this planet. I once asked a Swedish psychiatrist if she would be willing to receive Electro Shock Treatment. I asked her, because she was trying to defend it. As I asked her, she looked a little scared. She had herself helped in administering Electro Shock Treatment. I understand why she looked scared.  

I found the following good news today and I wanted to share it with you.

Tunedal
4 Mar 2003

 Subject: MEDICARE STOPS FUNDING "MULTIPLE ELECTROSHOCK

 MEDICARE STOPS FUNDING "MULTIPLE ELECTROSHOCK

 CMS Investigation reveals patients at "greater risk"

 LOS ANGELES: As of April 1, 2003, Medicare will cease all national

coverage

 of "multiple seizure" electroshock treatments, after an investigation

 revealed the practice is unworkable and places patients at risk. The

Center

 for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) conducted the investigation after

a

 December 2001 report by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) found

 multiple seizure electroshock had "none of the claimed benefits and many

 risks," including "profound confusional states." The Citizens Commission

on

 Human Rights International (CCHR), a psychiatric watchdog that has exposed

 the brain-damaging and lethal effects of electroshock, hailed the decision

 as a victory for patients' rights.

 Also known as multiple monitored ECT (MMECT), Medicare has been paying out

 $500,000 a year for its use. On February 24 this year, CMS said that

 Medicare would no longer cover this practice, stating, "The clinical

 effectiveness of multiple-seizure electroconvulsive therapy [ECT] has not

 been verified by scientifically controlled studies.studies have

demonstrated

 an increased risk of adverse effect.."

 CMS also found that in the elderly population, the risk may be "several

fold

 higher" than for "younger patients for severe confusion, falls, and

 cardiorespiratory complications." The elderly are a key market for ECT. In

 Texas, one of the few states that keeps track of shock statistics,

 65-year-olds get 360 percent more ECT than 64-year-olds because Medicare

 coverage takes effect at sixty-five.

 Ms. Jan Eastgate, the international president of CCHR, says that

 electroshock treatment involves "searing the brain with more volts of

 electricity than you'll find in your home. Between 180 to 460 volts of

 electricity sends a current pulsing through the brain creating a 'grand

mal'

 seizure, which is identical to an epileptic fit. The administering

 psychiatrist usually looks for a curling up or twitching of the toes to

 determine if the shock has 'worked.' Without this sign, multiple electric

 shocks have been given until the desired effect is achieved. Today, MMECT

 can induce up to eight seizures in one treatment."

 Electroshock has always been controversial, considering its origins arose

 out of Italian slaughterhouses. In 1938, Dr. Ugo Cerletti, head of the

 psychiatry department at the University of Rome, observed how pigs were

 prepared for slaughter using electroshock, which eased the job of slitting

 their throats. He was inspired, and began experimenting with electroshock

on

 humans. Broken bones and fractured vertebrae that resulted from the

 convulsions appeared to be of little concern.

 In the 1960s, psychiatrists added muscle relaxants to modify the assault

on

 the body. Today, the administration of ECT is a $3 billion a year industry

 in the United States with more than 100,000 Americans undergoing it, many

 involuntarily. Yet, a 2001 Colombia University study found ECT is so

 ineffective at ridding patients of their depression that nearly all of

those

 who receive it relapse within six months of stopping treatment.