Acroagonines: Ugo Cerletti’s audacious attempt to place the neurophysiological effects of electroconvulsive therapy in vials

In the years 1947–57, following a turbulent retirement, Ugo Cerletti, the father of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) (1938), invested his energies in a new audacious project conceived as an extension of his ECT research. Forced to leave the direction of the Sapienza University Clinic, he got funds fr...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Medical history 2022-07, Vol.66 (3), p.185-206
Main Author: Sirgiovanni, Elisabetta
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Archives & records
Brain research
Councils
Electroconvulsive therapy
Fascism
Historiography
Hypothalamus
Mental disorders
Neuroendocrine system
Neurosciences
Pituitary
Psychiatry
Psychopharmacology
Public schools
War
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Summary:In the years 1947–57, following a turbulent retirement, Ugo Cerletti, the father of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) (1938), invested his energies in a new audacious project conceived as an extension of his ECT research. Forced to leave the direction of the Sapienza University Clinic, he got funds from the National Research Council of Italy to carry out his experimental activities, and founded a ‘Center for the study of the physiopathology of Electro-shock’ in Rome. The Center was aimed at studying liquid substances extracted from electro-shocked animals’ brains that Cerletti named acroagonine and injected into human patients. Inspired by coeval literature, Cerletti believed that electroshock efficacy was due to stimulating some homeostatic processes in the brain, specifically in the meso-diencephalic area (i.e. involving neuroendocrine response in the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis). Cerletti’s team wished not only to find these effects, but also to reproduce them. With this hypothesis, that proved ineffective, Cerletti anticipated intuitions on the neuroendocrine effects of ECT and the necessity for the development of psychopharmacology. In this article, I cross-combined previously unexplored archival materials stored at Sapienza University of Rome (‘ES Section’) with established bibliographic and archival sources.
ISSN:0025-7273
2048-8343
DOI:10.1017/mdh.2022.16