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prof. dr hab. n. med. P. Bieńkowski Summary Objectives. In the last decade several authors described a robust and clinically relevant alleviation of depressive symptoms after infusions of the uncompetitive N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) glutamate receptor antagonist-ketamine. In the majority of published reports ketamine was administrated to patients with depression resistant to pharmacotherapy, but not to ECT. We present a series of 5 subjects suffering from multimodal treatment-resistant depression (including ECT or rTMS and various medications) treated with intravenous infusions of ketamine in a subanesthetic dose of 0.5 mg/kg in the naturalistic setting. To the best of our knowledge it is the first report on ketamine infusion in patient resistant to antidepressants and rTMS Methods. Two subjects have been diagnosed with MDD, one with BD, two with severe depressive episode. The efficacy and possible adverse events were monitored using psychometric scales. Basic life parameters and ECG were observed. Results. Ketamine's infusions showed transient antidepressant efficacy. Improvement rate in our group was significant lower than in previously reported. Ketamine was generally well tolerated. We noted transient BP variations and appearance of mild and transient dissociative symptoms. Low early response rate may be correlated with resistance to previous multimodal treatment, high rate of somatization and anxiety comorbidity or heterogeneity of our group. Conclusions. Our findings do not support the use of ketamine infusions as the monotherapy in the subgroup of patients with multimodal treatment resistant depression.

We report a patient who experienced atypical symptoms in the course of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). During ECT treatment patient experienced psychotic symptoms which should be differentiated with prolonged delirium and nonconvulsive status epilepticus. 46-year-old female was referred to hospital with a diagnosis of major depressive disorder with no psychotic features in the course of recurrent depression. Despite several changes of pharmacological treatment no improvement was achieved, therefore it was decided to initiate ECT. Physical and neurological examination revealed no deviations from the norm. The results of other tests (CT and EEG) were normal. 4 bilateral, bitemporal ECT procedures were performed. The course of each procedure was typical, the same doses of anesthetic medication and pulse dose was administered throughout all of the procedures. The duration of seizure was 32-40 s. Despite this mental symptoms observed during the course of the treatment differed from known to the authors from both their own experience and from literature. Delusions of reference, persecution, agitation, oneiric delusions and olfactory hallucinations which appeared after the 4th ECT session maintained for 14 days and resolved after treatment with olanzapine. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on delusions of reference and persecution, oneiric delusions and olfactory hallucinations associated with the course of ECT.