Anaesthesia in electroconvulsive therapy. Special conditions

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is one of the main techniques available for the treatment of such serious mental illnesses as schizophrenia and drug-resistant depression. The pre-anaesthetic assessment appropriate for patients with various mental disorders or pathologies does not differ substantially from that of any patient prior to undergoing anaesthesia for a surgical procedure. The present review aims to propose guidelines to achieve a higher level of safety and effectiveness during ECT in the most frequent situations, in accordance with the current literature.

We conducted a search on the role of anaesthesia in ECT in the Ovid MEDLINE, PubMed, and SciELO (Scientific Electronic Library Online) databases, with special attention to the populations undergoing this type of therapy. The search was carried out between 1978 and December 2016.

We included the 96 articles that contained the most important recommendations for the preparation of this guide.

We propose these guidelines in order to achieve a higher level of safety and effectiveness during ECT in special conditions. We also summarize the most important attitude to be taken into account by the anaesthesiologist in these cases.