Etomidate and unpredicted seizures during electroconvulsive therapy

Electroconvulsive therapy has been a novel treatment for about half a century, effective for severe psychiatric conditions. Over the years, the treatment has been refined with the addition of anesthesia. Different inducing agents have been used in clinical practice over the last few decades including propofol, methohexital, and etomidate. Previous literature rarely mentions seizures soon after induction with etomidate and typically only in anesthesia literature. We describe 2 cases with different demographics, diagnosis, and treatment that had seizures with the use of etomidate as an inducing agent.