The Return of Electroshock Therapy

Can Sarah Lisanby help electroconvulsive therapy - the most effective treatment for severe depression - shed its brutal reputation?

- Dan Hurley

One morning in early October, on her final day as the chair of the psychiatry and behavioral-sciences department at the Duke University School of Medicine, Sarah Hollingsworth Lisanby ushered me over to a display case in one of the department’s conference rooms. There, behind glass, sits the world’s only museum, such as it is, of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), or what most people still call “shock therapy.” The oldest artifacts on display, some of which are made of polished wood and brass, date to the late 19th century, when electrical stimulation was promoted as a cure for a host of ailments.