7. Bergonic Psychiatric Device
The Bergonic Psychiatric Device, or Bergonic Chair, was a device used to deliver an early form of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) to mentally ill patients. Electroconvulsive therapy, often colloquially known as electroshock therapy or just shock therapy, involves intentionally inducing seizures with electricity to treat mental illnesses including major depression. While ECT has a long history of widespread (and controversial) use, it is now used as a last-line treatment for only a handful of diseases.
ECT, when used today, must only be given after the informed consent of the patient. It is done just after other treatments have failed or in emergency cases where suicide is imminent without relief from symptoms. The focus on informed consent is due to misuse in the past where patients were shocked without their informed consent, or sometimes without any consent at all. ECT also has a history of having been used as a threat against “unruly” mentally ill patients, especially in the mid 20th century. Ken Kesey’s famous novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, depicts a fictionalized account of an unruly patient being shocked as a punishment. ECT also has a dark history of being used as part of gay conversion therapy, often against a patient’s will.