Hexafluorodiethyl ether (indoklon); an inhalant convulsant; its use in psychiatric treatment.

Seventy-five patients received 288 convulsive therapy treatments. A standard course of 12 treatments spaced at 3 treatments a week was given to all patients receiving some form of convulsive therapy in order to obtain comparative information. The type of convulsive therapy to be administered was determined on a random basis in order to obtain a comparative series. Alternate patients were given either hexafluorodiethyl ether as an inhalant or electroconvulsive therapy. It was repeatedly observed in the majority of patients upon whom the inhalant was employed that in the initial phases of their treatment the anesthetic-like vapor seemed less threatening than the concept of an electric current passing through their brain. It was also observed that as the patients improved they seemed to feel somewhat more apprehensive about the relatively slow onset of the effect of the inhalant in contrast to electric shock. The untoward effects observed appeared to be similar to those frequently encountered after electroconvulsive therapy but symptoms cleared in a very short time. While the mechanism by which the convulsive seizure is brought about is unknown at this time, hexafluorodiethyl ether produced the same results therapeutically as did electroconvulsive therapy.