PATIENTS admitted to a North West NHS Trust have received electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) on hundreds of occasions in the last five years, new figures reveal.

ECT – known as electric shock therapy – sends an electric current through someone’s brain while they are under general anaesthetic, and is used to treat some mental health problems including severe depression.

But a recent study published in the journal Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry has called for its use to be suspended immediately due to the risk of side effects such as brain damage, arguing that previous research into the procedure had been ‘poor’.

NHS Digital statistics show a patient was given ECT at least once on around 255 occasions at Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS Foundation Trust between 2014-15 and 2018-19.

That was one of the highest numbers recorded among 119 trusts in England.

Of those, 25 were in 2018-19 – the highest annual figure was for 2014-15, when there were 70.

The data counts each continuous period of care a patient admitted to hospital received from a consultant, during which they were given ECT as a main or secondary medical procedure.

Someone could undergo several courses of ECT during a given period of care.

Across England, trusts recorded almost 3,500 periods of care during which a patient received ECT over the five years.

The number dropped gradually over that time, from 796 in 2014-15 to 580 in 2018-19.

NHS Digital had stopped formally capturing or publishing the data before a mental health publication, supported by the Information Commission, campaigned to see the stats in January 2018.

In the most recent figures, there was wide variation between trusts – the figure stood at 125 for Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in Swindon in 2018-19, while many places recorded no use of the procedure.

Dr John Read, from the University of East London, said the poor quality of recent research into the therapy was such that ‘no conclusions about whether ECT works or not can be made’. He also co-authored a recent report arguing the treatment should be halted.

LSCFT was approached for comment.