Many people are afraid that treatment will erase their memory and permanently change their personality. Electroconvulsive therapy, popularly called electroshock, is clearly one of the most controversial treatment methods. But forget about Forman's "Flying Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and other movies that, more than healing, bother people with electric shocks. The reality is completely different. Although the method is burdened by stigma and a high degree of prejudice, it is in fact one of the most effective ways of treating patients with severe depression or schizophrenia. Compared to the past, it is painless, under general anesthesia, is highly effective and has managed to significantly reduce its risk. One million people around the world undergo it every year. Doctors from the Psychiatric Clinic of the General University Hospital in Prague (VFN) and the 1st Medical Faculty of Charles University were the first in the Czech Republic to provide it on an outpatient basis.

"Electroconvulsive therapy, so-called EKT, is currently a common part of psychiatric treatment. About a million people around the world go through it every year. Our clinic has about a hundred patients and twelve hundred individual therapies a year. The main indications for ECT are major depressive disorders, especially in patients who are not helped by drugs. We also use it for resistant psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and at least for patients with catatonia syndrome, " stated by the head of the Psychiatric Clinic of the General Hospital and the 1st Medical Faculty of Charles University doc. MUDr. Martin Anders, Ph.D.

For more information, see press release.