TREATMENT: Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

Most people have heard of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) or electroshock treatment, a treatment usually reserved for severe mental disorders, like depression that has been resistant to treatment with medication. ECT is pretty effective -- somewhere between 60 and 70 percent of people who are treated with ECT recover from their depression -- but it can be a rather unsettling procedure. ECT patients are anesthetized and electrodes placed on the front part of the brain induce a seizure, and memory loss is a common side effect from the treatment.

For people who are unable to treat their depression with medication, therapy, or lifestyle changes, there may be a new alternative to ECT. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been approved by the FDA to treat depressed people by passing an electrical current through the skull and into a particular area of the brain. A recent study found that depressed patients treated with TMS were 4 times as likely to recover from their depression than those who were treated with a placebo. The lead author of the study is hopeful that further research will help improve TMS success rates to that of ECT, since the two treatments likely work in a similar way.

Many people view ECT as a dangerous procedure, but the fact is that it has been proven to be an effective treatment for severe depression. I think it's very encouraging that less invasive and traumatizing alternatives to ECT, like TMS, are being studied and offered to depressed patients. What do you think? Do you have any experience with either treatment, or an opinion on their use?