forced electroshock in new york

[undergroundpanther]

On Thursday, May 31, 2007, New York State's High Court, the Court of Appeals in Albany, will hear argument for the first time on the subject of ECT, and in the Simone D. appeal, its involuntary administration.

Twenty-one years after that Court issued it's seminal ruling in Rivers v. Katz, dealing with the involuntary administration of psychotropic medication, the Court will finally entertain another appeal regarding forcible psychiatric treatment.

The stakes are extremely high, especially with the State Office of Mental Health vigorously, and without shame, pursuing the practice of involuntary maintenance shock where the performance of over 200 to 300 shocks on an individual patient over the course of that person's stay at the State hospital (usually involving several years) is more the norm than the rare exception.



http://mindfreedom.org/kb/mental-health-abuse/electroshock/simone-d/200705


2 July 2007 update: Simone D. has had more then 200 forced electroshocks. The State of New York went to court to give even more. Simone D.'s attorney, Dennis Feld, fought valiantly. But the courts agreed to order even more forced electroshock. Electroshock is also known as electroconvulsive therapy or ECT.....

Maybe that's the irony that convinces us that we need to continue to fight these battles if only to attempt to instill some sense into institutional psychiatry and continue to see if we can get the courts to understand that sometimes setting limits on what clinicians do in the name of treatment is indeed the best jurisprudence.
http://mindfreedom.org/kb/mental-health-abuse/electroshock/simone-d/200707

[lvx35]

1. The history of mental health is SO sordid. You'd think they would have learned.

At least if any dramatic treatment like this is to be preformed, it needs to be for the criminally insane, where they have been convicted of a crime.

[undergroundpanther]

5. I wouldn't torture anybody

I'd rather give death, quick and painless, rather than torture.Torture is a choice and it is evil.. Death it happens to all of us anyway.

[yowzayowzayowza]

15. Then again....

Tharze alota legitimate therapy that could easily be termed 'torture'. Unfortunately the line is not so fine.

[lvx35]

17. Its not about torture, its about the "not guilty by reason of insanity" bullshit.

We have these stupid legal precedents which state that a person can not be convicted of a crime if insane. Are you saying that since no therapy should be forced on anybody, that these people should just be let free even if they are child rapists and murderers? I'm sure you're not.

What I think we need is a "guilty by reason of insanity" verdict which separates the mentally ill who have committed serious crimes from those who haven't. In the case of the former, strong techniques could be applied without consent, in the case of the latter they could not be.

[Help me help Earth]

20. You want the government deciding whether or not to kill the mentally ill?

That's disgusting and idiotic. If you cant trust them to administer treatment, which your post clearly suggests we shouldn't, why in the world would you trust them with the power to murder you?

[Hippo_Tron]

2. I was under the impression that we stopped doing electroshock

K and R

[Hieronymus]

3. It's become more "acceptable" recently.

[tom_paine]

8. Of course it has. An evil and abusive porcedure is just the thing for a Third World Nation

like Imperial Amerika.

Just wait, when Crunch Time comes, more than a few DUers will be getting electroshocks for "mental health" in Halliburton Homeland Security Detention, Concentration and Re-Eductaion Camps.

[undergroundpanther]

4. No electroshock is back

New freedom commission,TMAP reccomends it.
http://www.dominionpaper.ca/health/2005/06/06/psychiatry.html
http://www.endofshock.com/
http://www.interstateq.com/archives/2230/
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=3397685

Fucking authoritarian mad "scientists"never understand what humane means.

[nofurylike]

6. thank you for posting this. i hope people will take the actions that

are asked for at those links.


peace and solidarity

[nofurylike]

7. k & r

[michaz]

9. My son is a mental health advocate! I couldn't believe it when he

told me about this!! He fights for the health of the patient at all levels. It is obvious there needs to be more mental health advocates.

[DeSwiss]

10. K&R n/t

[tomp]

11. 2-300? that's an awful lot of ect.

ect helps a lot of people (i know this to be a fact so there is no point in disputing it with me). rarely, in my experience, does it not produce some benefit, and usually it prodeces great benefit.

that being said, 2-300 treatments is geometrically more treatments than i've ever heard of.

also, the article says nothing about the reasons behind these involutary treatments.

before the flames start let me say i am a strong proponent of patients' rights. i believe in a small minority of cases patients need to be treated "over objection", but i believe this happens too much in our mental health care system.

[Cetacea]

12. self-delete eom.

[On the Road]

13. This is Pretty Much Exactly What I Was Going to Post, Tomp

1) Treatment as disruptive as ECT should never be forcible.

2) 200-300 treatments is an unbelievable number. I wonder whether it's not a mistake.

3) Having said that, I have known seriously depressed people who swear by the effects.

[tomp]

18. i would never say never.

but i would say avoid forcible treatment of any kind, including meds, until there is NO other reasonable alternative. we also need improved legal representation for those suffering from "mental illness" (aka: mental difference).

love your sig line. one of my desert island discs.

[provis99]

14. who posted this? A Scientologist?

Nuts like Tom Cruise have been arguing against ECT; if I'm going to choose between peer-reviewed journals, decades of clinical trials, and the evidence of my own eyes, or choose a Scientologist-sounding lawyer, I would pick the ECTs. The article doesn't specify why the patient received the shocks; probably a violently depressed person. Me and my siblings had to deal with an extremely abusive father until he was put into ECT for depression, whereupon he became a friendly, sociable person.

Modern ECT isn't like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. You are anaethesized before you receive the shock, and given muscle relaxants, and receive a small voltage jolt. The psychological change immediately following the treatment is remarkable. And no, you do not turn into a vegetable.

I suppose if they didn't give the patient these shocks, likely they'd be locked in a padded cell, in a prison. I can only assume that the person was violent and a threat to others or themselves, but that would be the only category I could think of that would call for involuntary treatment. So which is better, involuntary treatments, or a prison where they would likely kill themselves or another inmate?

[Javaman]

16. Gimmie gimmie shock treatment! nt

[mdmc]

19. thanks for the info

doing something now...

[mdmc]

21. kick - happening right under Spitzer's nose

:patriot: