An analysis of psychiatric hospitals delivering ECT reveals a systemic failure to inform patients of risks the FDA recommended eight years ago. Failed oversight and court findings on brain damage are fueling renewed calls for a ban.
By CCHR International
The Mental Health Industry Watchdog
June 19, 2026
The Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) International reviewed more than 50 psychiatric hospitals across 23 states that administer electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). Their analysis found grossly inadequate risk information on their websites. None have updated materials to reflect the adverse effects the FDA required for mitigating risks in 2018. CCHR states that tens of thousands of Americans, including children, are not being warned about long-term memory loss and potential brain damage, warranting a government investigation and review of the need to ban ECT devices.
Thousands opposed the FDA’s reclassification of ECT devices from high-risk Class III to lower-risk Class II for limited uses, with many calling for an outright ban. The FDA’s 2018 final rule justified the change partly by requiring patient labeling to warn that “[t]he long-term safety and effectiveness of ECT treatment has not been demonstrated” and recommending formal neuropsychological assessments before and during treatment to monitor cognitive damage.[1] None of the facilities report this.
CCHR’s review also shows the hospitals failed to warn of:
- Permanent memory loss (88%, 46 hospitals)
- Cardiovascular problems (69%, 36 hospitals)
- The right to refuse consent (88%, 46 hospitals)
Federal agencies bear much of ECT’s costs, even though psychiatrists admit it cannot cure and often requires ongoing “maintenance” treatments. A private insurance analysis found that ECT patients were hospitalized 4 to 29 days longer than those receiving standard treatment, with additional healthcare costs of $5,700 to $52,700.[2]
Psychiatrists who practice ECT often earn roughly twice the salary of other psychiatrists. ECT is estimated to be a $5.05 – $7.6 billion-a-year industry.[3]
ECT delivers up to 460 volts of electricity through the brain to induce a grand mal seizure, involving loss of consciousness and violent muscle contractions (masked by anesthetics and muscle relaxants). Higher voltages used today have increased risks.[4] Devices were grandfathered in 1976 without premarket approval or clinical trials proving safety and efficacy.[5]
The FDA’s 2018 Final Rule specified there is no clinical data supporting safety and efficacy for schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, or mania (which remain Class III). Despite this, 71% (37) of the hospitals promote ECT for schizophrenia/schizoaffective disorders—including the Department of Veterans Affairs—and 35% (18) promote it for mania. The FDA lists mania and worsening psychiatric symptoms as adverse effects.
Some also promote it off-label for autism, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and dementia, despite ECT’s known memory loss effects.
Many hospital claims are misleading and unsubstantiated, including:
- “ECT is a minimally invasive treatment… like jump-starting a car battery” (A jump start typically uses 12 to 14 volts—ECT uses more than 30 times that.)
- ECT “turns the brain on and off just like a computer.”
- ECT “can alter an individual’s brain chemistry by releasing chemicals in the brain and encouraging the brain cells to make new connections.”
- ECT is “no worse than going to the dentist.”
Court Precedents for Informed Consent
The need for full informed consent regarding ECT has been upheld in courts.
A historic ECT legal case in the Superior Court for the State of California in the County of Sacramento was settled out of court shortly before the scheduled trial date of May 11, 2026. It was the first time individual psychiatrists and a hospital have successfully been sued for damage caused by ECT in California, or for failure to inform about the risks involved. Two women who had received 11 and 30 electroshock treatments at the Sutter Center for Psychiatry in Sacramento, alleged that they had suffered, as a result of the treatments: “brain damage, neurocognitive injuries, permanent memory loss, impaired visual and verbal memory, significant decline in their ability to learn and recall information, a disruption and decline in the ability to encode new information, loss of executive function, additional physical, physiological, psychological and emotional injuries and economic harms.” The allegations included: “common-law negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, medical malpractice, and battery” arising out of “serious and debilitating cognitive injuries.”[6]
The plaintiffs also alleged that they were administered ECT treatments without obtaining their informed consent, thereby committing battery by performing shock treatment on the plaintiffs without obtaining their informed consent.
The treating psychiatrist had also “concealed from Plaintiffs that he had been convicted for a felony arising out of his practice of medicine (illegally selling body parts and organs of deceased veterans) and that he had previously had his medical license suspended by the California Medical Board as a result of his criminal and reprehensible conduct.”
In 2024, the California Supreme Court ruled to remove a loophole that allowed ECT device manufacturers and drug companies to argue that only a doctor’s testimony mattered and the patient’s testimony was irrelevant. When a doctor testified that he or she would have prescribed the procedure notwithstanding a warning, the case could be dismissed. Wisner Baum, LLP, senior partner Bijan Esfandiari successfully argued that device manufacturers who fail to warn of risks associated with their products can no longer avoid liability by misusing the learned intermediary doctrine. This legal principle stated that manufacturers of prescription drugs and medical devices fulfil their duty to warn patients of potential product risks by providing adequate warnings to the prescribing physician only, rather than directly to the patient.[7]
Testimony before the Nebraska Supreme Court (2025) concluded that “ECT causes persistent or permanent memory loss and brain damage in a substantial proportion of recipients—somewhere between 12% and 55%,” a finding which the court upheld.[8]
In 2023, a Florida jury found Somatics Inc, a manufacturer of ECT machines, guilty of failing to inform doctors of the risks. Plaintiff Jeffrey Thelen alleged in his lawsuit that Somatics failed to adequately warn about the known risks associated with its ECT machines, including brain damage, severe permanent memory loss, permanent neurocognitive injuries, and others. The jury in Jeffrey Thelen v. Somatics, LLC unanimously found Somatics guilty of failing to warn about those risks when placing their ECT machine on the market. [9]
In October 2018, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that there was sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to find that an ECT device caused brain injury.[10]
A South Carolina woman previously won a jury verdict of more than $600,000 in 2005 against a doctor after suffering devastating memory loss following ECT. [11]
John Read, Ph.D., who testified in the recently settled case, also pointed out that ECT device manufacturer MECTA filed for bankruptcy in late 2021 and no longer sells the Spectrum machine—the device used by Sutter—but began marketing a new machine in 2020, the “Sigma” machine. “It is unclear whether their new machine is any safer than the discontinued one,” he said. “It is to be hoped that legal cases like these, whether they go to trial or are settled at the last minute out of court, will encourage psychiatrists to think twice before administering such a potentially damaging treatment, and might at least ensure that patients and families are given better information about the risks in future.”
CCHR’s analysis of the information psychiatric hospitals provide to patients about ECT reveals a serious and ongoing failure to deliver proper informed consent. CCHR applauds the initiative of law firms such as Wisner Baum—the firm has championed patients’ informed consent rights and autonomy and has been a leader in bringing to light the true dangers of ECT.
Neuropathologists equate ECT’s effects to traumatic brain injury, with victims suffering permanent cognitive impairment.[12]
The FDA erroneously claimed involuntary ECT is “uncommon” and always requires a judicial proceeding. In reality, state laws vary widely: six states have no ECT laws; many jurisdictions lack provisions for judicial oversight.[13] Only seven states require a court order for ECT on minors; 12 have no regulations for children.[14] Texas and California ban ECT on minors, due to CCHR’s actions.
Jan Eastgate, President of CCHR International, received ECT in 1975 after a misdiagnosis of hyperthyroidism as depression. “After antidepressants worsened my condition, I was told I needed ECT, that it was the same as jump-starting the heart, and there were no major side effects. It was a lie. The claims comparing it to dental work, childbirth, or defibrillating the heart are fraudulent, and the practice should be banned.” She has dedicated her life since 1977 to warning others of the dangers and the need for thorough medical examinations to rule out undiagnosed physical conditions.
Psychiatrist Niall McLaren advises patients that any psychiatrist who tells them “‘You need ECT’ is really only saying, ‘I don’t know what else to do.’” He is adamant: “No psychiatrist needs to use ECT.”[15]
CCHR calls for individuals damaged by ECT to report the abuse to it and encourages families and doctors to watch its documentary, Electroshock: Therapy or Torture.
[1] “Neurological Devices; Reclassification of Electroconvulsive Therapy Devices; Effective Date of Requirement for Premarket Approval for Electroconvulsive Therapy Devices for Certain Specified Intended Uses,” Food and Drug Administration, 26 Dec. 2018, https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/12/26/2018-27809/neurological-devices-reclassification-of-electroconvulsive-therapy-devices-effective-date-of
[2] Ganesh G, Ithman M, and Malwitz K. “Predictors of length of stay in a psychiatric hospital,” International Journal of Psychiatry in Clinical Practice, 2015; 19:4, 238-244, abstract https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26073671/; “Electroconvulsive therapy linked to longer hospital stays, increased costs,” Science Daily, 15 July 2021, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/07/210714131856.htm
[3] Anne Marie McKersie, “Effects of Funding on Electroconvulsive Therapy in California,” Master’s Thesis, San Diego State University, Spring 2011; https://www.cchrint.org/2026/05/16/cchr-highlights-concerns-over-coercive-and-failed-140-billion-mental-health-practices-at-psychiatric-convention/
[4] https://www.cchrint.org/2025/04/11/blaming-patients-for-failed-psychiatric-treatments-to-fuel-a-51-billion-brain-device-industry/; Douglas G. Cameron, “ECT: Sham Statistics, the Myth of Convulsive Therapy, and the Case for Consumer Misinformation,” The Journal of Mind and Behavior, Vol 15, No 1 and 2, Winter and Spring 1994, pp 177-198, http://www.ectresources.org/ECTscience/Cameron__DG___1994_critique_of_ECT.pdf
[5] “A History of Medical Device Regulation & Oversight in the United States,” Food and Drug Administration, 21 Aug. 2023, https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/overview-device-regulation/history-medical-device-regulation-oversight-united-states
[6] John Read, Ph.D., “Landmark Electroconvulsive Therapy Case Settled Out of Court,” Psychology Today, 16 June 2026, https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/psychiatry-through-the-looking-glass/202606/landmark-electroconvulsive-therapy-case-settled
[7] Christopher Grey Campbell, Emily Ballard Marshall, Sarah Carrier, “Just What the Doctor Ordered: Recent Developments in the Learned Intermediary Doctrine,” The Brief, 10 June 2025, https://www.americanbar.org/groups/tort_trial_insurance_practice/resources/brief/2025-spring/recent-developments-learned-intermediary-doctrine/
[8] “THELEN v. Elektrika, Inc., Defendant. (2025),” https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-11th-circuit/117778022.html
[9] John Read, Ph.D., “Landmark Electroconvulsive Therapy Case Settled Out of Court,” Psychology Today, 16 June 2026, https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/psychiatry-through-the-looking-glass/202606/landmark-electroconvulsive-therapy-case-settled
[10] https://www.cchrint.org/2026/05/16/cchr-highlights-concerns-over-coercive-and-failed-140-billion-mental-health-practices-at-psychiatric-convention/; David Karen, “ECT Litigation Update: Are Patients Being Warned of Brain Damage Risk?” MAD, 13 June 2019, https://www.madinamerica.com/2019/06/ect-litigation-patients-not-warned-brain-damage-risk/
[11] John Read, Ph.D., “Landmark Electroconvulsive Therapy Case Settled Out of Court,” Psychology Today, 16 June 2026, https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/psychiatry-through-the-looking-glass/202606/landmark-electroconvulsive-therapy-case-settled
[12] https://www.cchrint.org/2025/04/11/blaming-patients-for-failed-psychiatric-treatments-to-fuel-a-51-billion-brain-device-industry/; “Electroconvulsive Shock ‘Therapy’ (ECT) Lawsuit,” Wisner Baum, https://www.wisnerbaum.com/defective-medical-device-injuries/ect/
[13] Victoria Harris, MD, MPH, “Electroconvulsive Therapy: Administrative Codes, Legislation, and Professional Recommendation,” Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry & The Law, 4:406–11, 2006; Robin Livingston, et al., “Regulation of Electroconvulsive Therapy: A Systematic Review of US State Laws,” National Library of Medicine, Mar. 2018, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28991068/
[14] Minju Hwang, et al., “Shock and Law: Unraveling State by State How and If ECT Can Be Offered for Psychiatric Conditions Occurring in Child and Adolescent Patients,” Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, Oct. 2024, https://www.jaacap.org/article/S0890-8567(24)01527-2/fulltext
[15] https://www.cchrint.org/2023/11/03/patients-given-electroshock-brain-damage-recourse/; Niall McLaren, “No Psychiatrist Needs to Use ECT,” Mad In America, 27 June 2017, https://www.madinamerica.com/2017/06/no-psychiatrist-needs-use-ect/
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