The electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is an effective treatment used for several psychiatric disorders. However, there are multiple enigmas about the mechanisms of action and factors that improve its results. Some frequent questions are if the anesthetic drug makes a difference in the time of convulsion and blood pressure.

Our principal aim is to describe the utilization of anesthetic drugs among the patients that are being treated with ECT in hospital del Mar. We also want to know the differences in the time of convulsion and systolic arterial pressure for every anesthetic drug (propofol, thiopental and etomidate).

We have used the database of ECT in hospital del Mar. It contains information like age, principal diagnosis, medical background and pharmacological treatment at the moment of starting ECTs; it also contains information of each individual ECT session as basal, 2 and 5 minutes arterial pressure; the anesthetic drug used, and convulsion duration.

We made an analysis of general conditions of the population, the differences of convulsion time and arterial pressure between the three anesthetic drugs.

Propofol was used in 1140 sessions, thiopental in 61 sessions and etomidate in 54 sessions. The differences in the means of convulsion times between propofol and etomidate are statistically significant (“P” value < 0.05). Etomidate or thiopental increases the difference of arterial pressure more than propofol.

Further research about the factors that improve convulsion duration and minimize adverse effects on blood pressure is needed.

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.