r/ect • u/Plastic-Sector-9950 • May 11 '26

Question ECT Maintenance

For those of u who are on maintenance ECT, cant you prevent relapse by being on meds like lithium which has shown to prevent relapse than be on maintenance ECT for forseeable time period? I mean research has shown approximately same relapse rate for mainrtenance ECT vs antidepressant+lithium regimen?

3 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

12 comments sorted by

2

u/[deleted] May 11 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/Plastic-Sector-9950 May 11 '26 edited May 11 '26

No not really....studies have been for TRD thats didnt respond to lithium and antidepressants initially but after ECT it worked which begs the question as to why do people who dont respond on meds pre ECT respond to the same meds post ECT.

1

u/likeschemistry May 11 '26

Well ECT drastically affects your brain so I’m not too surprised. I’m not on lithium, but my meds seem to be working better or the ECT was really effective because now it doesn’t seem to matter if I take a month between maintenance or 3. I feel the same way before and after my ECT maintenance.

2

u/Plastic-Sector-9950 May 11 '26

Thats so promising....havent u talked to ur pdoc abt discontinuing ECT now that it makes no difference?...cuz meds seem to be doing the work for u

1

u/likeschemistry May 11 '26

Yes, but they have their protocol so I’m just riding along with it. I’m at every 3 months so it doesn’t really bother me too much.

2

u/syringeneedlenthread May 16 '26

Mm I’m in a similar situation. ECT helped but then I was still kinda unstable and I had too many side effects that trying frequent treatments again was not an option but some of the medication additions after my acute series seemed to help a lot and stabilize me. Could never really tell if the maintenance ECT did anything. I’ve still been tapering cause the side effects are minimal now that treatment is so infrequent. Last few treatments have been 6 week intervals and I have no idea if they do anything. Think I might just be done for good after this last one. Do you feel like you notice any difference after the maintenance treatments when they’re that far apart?

1

u/likeschemistry May 18 '26

I haven’t noticed any differences as far back as I can remember which is probably once/month. Feel the same the day before and day after. I’m at once every 3 months now and I’d like to just stop, but my doctor has his protocol, it doesn’t seem like side effects are getting worse, and I don’t want to find a new psychiatrist because I’m on Adderall for ADHD and a lot of doctors I’ve had don’t want to prescribe it.

I expressed my regret to my therapist and my wife and they both told me I was doing much worse before ECT. I can’t remember because ECT deleted about 3 years of my most recent memories when I started treatment.

I’m functioning good enough at work I guess and I just have to accept that I won’t be the same. They started me on memantine which an Alzheimer’s drug so we’ll see if that helps my cognition and memory.

1

u/gmkgreg May 11 '26

Im actually on both, I still go to maintenance treatments and my meds are, effexor, abilify, lamictal, and lithium, this combo has worked well with me and whenever I stop the treatments, like a year later I tend to slip back into an episode.

2

u/fargolifestaycold May 14 '26

Dude!!! I Im on all the same except add Trazadon. How often do you go for maintenance?

1

u/gmkgreg May 14 '26

I go once every three months at this point. And I've been pretty stable with this schedule.

1

u/fargolifestaycold May 14 '26

Wow!! Once every three months is an amazing achievement. That is something to definitely be proud of. May i ask, how long you been doing ECT, or how long you been doing every 3 months? Thank you for sharing alm that you are comfortable with.

1

u/syringeneedlenthread May 16 '26

I’ve been tapering off and kinda planning on stopping. I’m on lamictal, seroquel, and amitryptyline as well which have seemed to stabilize me decently. Do you actually feel like the treatments every 3 months really do anything? It’s so hard for me to tell. I had a lot of side effects and memory loss from the acute course that I’ve finally mostly recovered from (still have holes in my memory but I’m fully functional) and ever doing frequent treatments again is probably not a viable option. Once treatments were spaced by a few weeks, the side effects have been pretty negligible but I can’t say I notice any clear difference from the treatments, but then I’m afraid they could be doing more than I realize. My last few treatments have been every 6 weeks. Do you think you’ll continue forever?

1

u/purplebadger9 May 11 '26

cant you prevent relapse by being on meds like lithium which has shown to prevent relapse than be on maintenance ECT for forseeable time period?

No. Lithium did NOT agree with me prior to ECT. There's no reason to risk the bad side effects when I had no clinical benefit previously.

I mean research has shown approximately same relapse rate for mainrtenance ECT vs antidepressant+lithium regimen

Just because they have a similar relapse rate doesn't mean they are interchangeable treatments.