The clinical use of electroconvulsive therapy in old age

A retrospective review was conducted on the charts of 33 elderly inpatients (age range, 62-85 years) who received electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in a geriatric psychiatry unit of a general hospital. Electroconvulsive therapy was found to be safe but not uniformly effective; only 42.4 per cent of patients obtained an immediate good outcome. The implications of these findings for further evaluations of the indications and efficacy of ECT in old age are discussed.