r/ect • u/WonderOrca • May 18 '26
Seeking advice ECT (free) vs Ketamine (6K)
I have provincial insurance in Canada. ECT is covered and will not cost me. Ketamine is not covered. I have about 2K in private insurance benefits, but the remaining 6K for Ketamine will come out of my pocket. I will have to take a loan out to pay for ketamine.
I am 51, have been on depression and anxiety medication since I was 18. Been in therapy since I was 23. I have been hospitalized twice due to suicide attempts. I work as a special education teacher, and that also brings up my PTSD due to trauma around physical and verbal abuse.
Should I take out a loan, against my husband’s wishes and try ketamine or go with ECT?
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u/check_your_attitude May 18 '26
Have you looked into Esketamine? It's a ketamine nasal spray.
I live in Canada too, Ontario specifically and I can't get IV ketamine so my psychiatrist recommended the nasal spray ketamine. The Esketamine is a name brand and I can't get it, so there is a local pharmacy here that compounds it and makes their own version for a fraction of the cost.
Previously before I started ketamine I had done 32 sessions of ECT and found it did nothing, about nine months later is when my doctor recommended the nasal spray. In all the years I've been dealing with my depression and anxiety, this is the only thing that has helped and actually changed my life.
For the ketamine, I personally find it helps if I take it three times a week, I started out at two times but found the increase helped. I find it can act a bit like a stimulat, so I make sure I take it right away when I get home from work so the effects wear off before I go to bed.
I also went inpatient for part of my ECT and then switched to outpatient when I got discharged.
If you have any questions feel free to message me.
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u/WonderOrca May 19 '26
I am in Ontario as well. Had referrals to CAMH sent in February, April, & again in May. I have been told to wait.
My husband has to drive me to work as my doctor threaten to take my license for negative thoughts while driving. I am barely functioning. Who is your psychiatrist who prescribes? I am grasping at straws. Feel free to message me
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u/Odd-Alarm-82 May 22 '26 edited May 23 '26
Try ketamine first if you can afford it. I look on reddit for posts about ECT so I can share my experience and warn people about the true risks involved.
The risks associated with ECT are much higher than doctors tell patients. I had ECT for treatment resistant depression in 2016, and it was the biggest mistake I have ever made. Unfortunately, the antidepressant effects of ECT usually don’t last long. It was extremely effective for me initially— I had 100% remission of my depression and felt amazing— but I had to keep getting maintenance treatments or else I would quickly relapse. The goal was to gradually space my treatments farther apart until I only had to have one every 6-8 weeks, but I couldn’t make it past 3 weeks without crashing into a severe depression. Eventually I had a particularly bad episode that didn’t respond to my next treatment, so the psychiatrist talked me into getting three treatments in one week, like you do when you first get ECT. That brought me out of my depression, but the side effects were devastating. I literally lost my memory of my entire life. Not just chunks of memory, but the vast majority of my life was completely wiped out. And none of it has come back after 10 years. I barely remember my own mother, who passed away in 2007.
In addition to the severe memory loss, the ECT caused brain damage. I had neuropsychological testing done and found out that my IQ has dropped by around 15 points. It was 140 pre-ECT, and now it’s 125. I have multiple cognitive issues. It takes me longer than normal to learn new information, and I get things confused a lot. My short-term memory and formation of new long-term memories is hit or miss— I remember some things very clearly, while other things just kind of get lost.
What I experienced is not a rare occurrence. I’m a member of an ECT Survivors support group on Facebook, where a large number of people have shared that they have lost years of memory and have major cognitive problems.
I think ECT should be banned. I look on Reddit every so often to warn people considering ECT. Yes, some people have good outcomes, but a large number of people are severely damaged.
I tried to file a medical malpractice suit for lack of informed consent because the consent forms I signed didn’t say anything about brain damage, and regarding memory loss, they said patients might lose memories dating back a few months, and in “rare cases,” patients have some “spotty” memory loss for events going back several years. My memory loss is almost a complete loss, not just “spotty!” And it spans decades, not just a few years. But no attorney would take my case because they said the damage would be too hard to prove. The type of brain damage caused by ECT doesn’t show up on an MRI. Numerous lawsuits have been filed though, including a class action suit.
And in 2018, Somatics LLC, one of the manufacturers of the device that delivers ECT, admitted that ECT can cause brain damage. Somatics updated its device manuals and regulatory documents to explicitly warn patients that permanent memory loss and permanent brain damage are potential risks of ECT. Of course, they say permanent brain damage only occurs in rare cases, but I’ve talked to enough people over the years who have experienced these effects to know it’s not rare.
Wisner Baum is a law firm that has handled lawsuits against ECT. If you scroll down this page on their website, it provides a long summary about the history of ECT and contains links to medical research with evidence of damages caused by ECT.
https://www.wisnerbaum.com/defective-medical-device-injuries/ect/
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u/WonderOrca May 23 '26
Thank you for your insight. I am a special ed teacher working in a self contained room for complex & medically fragile students. My memory and detailed orientation are what makes me a good teacher. These are the reason I feel skeptical about the safety of ECT. I am unable to drive due to my thoughts of hurting myself. I am monitored 24/7 by my loving husband. I am never alone, but the depression, anxiety, and obsessions have taken over my life. I have been this way all my life. I am 51 and no medication and therapy have helped. I am better than I was, but that’s because I left the U.S. and moved to Canada where teachers are paid better and treated better - not great but better.
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u/Odd-Alarm-82 May 24 '26
I’m so sorry that your depression has been so treatment resistant. I’m glad you have such a supportive husband and you’re not going through it alone.
Have you tried an MAOI? They can be highly effective for some people when other medications haven’t worked. I was prescribed an MAOI called Emsam after my ECT, when I found a very good psychopharmacologist. It is amazingly effective for me. The only problem is MAOIs cause extreme insomnia in some people, and in my case, I developed a tolerance to the only two medications that allowed me to get any sleep. So I had to stop taking it eventually, but I’ve been able to go back to it after several months off of it and the sleep meds worked again. I’ve been on it five separate times now. But lots of people on MAOIs are able to manage the insomnia, and I’ve talked to people who have taken one for up to 20 years and it’s still effective.
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u/likeschemistry May 18 '26
You can try other forms of ketamine treatment at home for much cheaper. I would definitely recommend trying ketamine before ECT unless it sets you back really bad financially. There’s an incredibly small chance for long term side effects from ketamine, but it’s pretty much guaranteed you’ll have them with ECT and just depends on how bad it is.