Electroshock Therapy ECT unit 1940's Rahm Electro-Shock Custom Case

Description

The elusive Rahm ECT unit is a model that I seldom see come up. It has a great simple design and has one of the best control panels with the menacing ‘shock’ button in a very straight forward impersonal way. This particular model is quite early, if not, an early prototype — I have never seen one with a graph recorder. The small carbon paper would record the patients surge output on the graph during a session. When I acquired the unit the case was in poor condition and instead of rebuilding in wood I decided to make it clear to show the inner workings of this machine. I replaced two in-line fuses on the power cord and it fired up the machine— the recorder started spinning. It came with the original electrode wires and extra graphs too. Originally Rahm Instruments filed for a patent in September 8 1941, yet there is little information other than in medical journals such as JAMA, JSTOR and PubMed that list effects of use of this device. Many results are not favorable.
Last photo shows item in use