Why Electroshock Therapy Is Back
Please support us on https://www.patreon.com/MinuteEarth or as a YouTube Sponsor! Thanks to everyone who already does! Shocking the brain has come and gone as a medical treatment, but it's...
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Hi, this is Kate from MinuteEarth. In the mid-20th century, a standard treatment for severe depression was to attach electrodes to a patient's skull and turn on the juice, running an electrical current through the brain that would cause a brief seizure - a process known as "electroshock therapy." It was *shockingly* brutal, sometimes causing broken bones and temporary short term memory loss. Eventually, public awareness of these side effects led to growing resistance to electroshock therapy and a steep decline in its use. But the thing was, electroshock DID work, alleviating depression in ⅔ of patients - more than responded to drugs. Electrical therapy likely works because depression seems to stem from when the brain's regular electrical s...
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Hi, this is Kate from MinuteEarth. In the mid-20th century, a standard treatment for severe depression was to attach electrodes to a patient's skull and turn on the juice, running an electrical current through the brain that would cause a brief seizure - a process known as "electroshock therapy." It was *shockingly* brutal, sometimes causing broken bones and temporary short term memory loss. Eventually, public awareness of these side effects led to growing resistance to electroshock therapy and a steep decline in its use. But the thing was, electroshock DID work, alleviating depression in ⅔ of patients - more than responded to drugs. Electrical therapy likely works because depression seems to stem from when the brain's regular electrical s...
