KBOO radio host, Paul Roland, interviews electroshock survivor Michael Sturman and David Potter from Rethinking Psychiatry. What is it like to receive electroshock? What is it like to live afterwards with electroshock induced trauma? What is the significance of the recent legal victory in California over a shock machine manufacturer?
Michael Sturman has an M.A. in psychology from the University of Detroit (1969) and practiced psychology for over thirty years in a number of settings. At sixteen he was a patient at a state hospital in Michigan where he received 20-30 bilateral electroshock treatments, and underwent a long and difficult road to recovery. He is now retired, and lives in Eugene, Oregon.
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Click the play button below to listen to the program. A transcript of the program is available here.
I had more than 20 treatments of ECT using bilateral and sine wave techniques and the voltage exceeded my seizure threshold by at least 3.
Under these conditions 12.4% of patients develop long term cognitive, memory and executive function deficits. Those treatments were in 2010-2011. I still cannot remember most of my life and exhibit a great deal of traumatic brain injury symptoms.
Why isn’t ECT continuing to be studied for efficacy AND why are there no studies beyond 6 months to study long term effects??
I have suffered from this as well!
Both my parents where given electric shock treatments in late 50,s into60 ‘s which changed them considerably I was an only child an then his totally as a child changed my life I ended up in a foster home I just heard about family’s getting compensated I know I’m late but I want to know how to go about this Thankyou Clara Chowns