NEW SPARKS OVER ELECTROSHOCK

摘要

On some gut level, the whole idea of electroshock therapy is absurd. At a time when people with mental illnesses can choose from a pharmacological cornucopia, why would they have electricity run through their brain instead? Didn't electroshock disappear around the same time as three-martini lunches? Actually, electroconvulsive therapy, as psychiatrists call it, has remained a common treatment for those who are severely depressed and who don't respond to (or can't tolerate) drugs. Its use has been quietly on the rise in the past two decades. Because most states don't require reporting on electroshock, there are no hard figures, but many people in the electroshock world agree that at least 100,000 Americans receive the treatment annually, up from a 1980 federal estimate of 33,000. Research on electroshock has also surged. Just last month the American Psychiatric Association released a second edition of its report on electroconvulsive therapy; it lists more than 1,000 citations.