ELECTROSHOCK THERAPY
A Review of Over 23,000 Treatments Using Unidirectional Currents
PAUL H. WILCOX M. D.1
1 The Traverse City State Hospital, Traverse City, Mich.
1. Forty percent of the most chronic patients showed significant improvement in ward behavior if adequately and repeatedly treated with suitable type of electroshock therapy. Relapses must be treated whenever they occur over months and years.
2. At least 60% of early cases, aged 60 or under, were rehabilitated within 1 year when adequately treated and 65% by the end of the second year after the start of treatment.
3. Adequate treatment means intensive treatment until the expected improvement has occurred and intensive treatment of relapses when they occur. No patient, otherwise suitable who still is not rehabilitated after 1 year, has had an adequate trial of treatment with less than 20 treatments.
4. An ideal therapy is one which achieves beneficial results without causing accumulating brain damage, thus permitting its use repeatedly for years if necessary.
5. This ideal is approached by the relatively low intensity 60-cycle pulsating direct current used in the treatment of the patients reviewed in this paper. This technique also has been accompanied by an exceptionally low percentage of skeletal complications.
