Out on PubMed today is this article from Adriana Hermida of Emory University and colleagues, describing a new bedside assessment of cognitive functioning for use in ECT services:

ElectroConvulsive Therapy Cognitive Assessment (ECCA) Tool: A New Instrument to Monitor Cognitive Function in Patients Undergoing ECT

Adriana P Hermida 1, Felicia C Goldstein 2, David W Loring 2, Shawn M McClintock 3, Richard D Weiner 4, Irving M Reti 5, A Umair Janjua 6, Zixun Ye 7, Limin Peng 7, Yi-Lang Tang 6, Gail C Galendez 6, Mustafa M Husain 3, Daniel F Maixner 8, Patricio Riva-Posse 6, William M McDonald 6, National Network of Depression Centers ECT Task Group
J Affect Disord, 269, 36-42 2020 Mar4[Online ahead of print] PMID: 32217341

 The pdf is here.

 The ECCA is offered as a simple, quick (less than 10 minutes) instrument for repeated cognitive assessment during a course of ECT. It is meant to be a more sensitive alternative to the MoCA and MMSE. As noted in the paper, it is available to practitioners at fuquacenter.org/ecca.
The ECCA is a welcome addition to the toolkit of rating scales/assessments for clinical use on ECT services; it will be interesting to see how it performs in wider use, how it compares to other instruments such as the QIDS, and how widely it is adopted.

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