All CTIP members have endorsed the statement. The FDA was preparing to grant the APA's petition when the CTIP came in to oppose reclassification and to press for an investigation. Throughout the rest of the 1980s, the CTIP both enlarged its shock patient membership and also became the central contact for other individuals and organizations who urged an FDA investigation of shock treatment, including all fifty of the state Protection and Advocacy agencies. Expansion of the CTIP was based on its informed consent statement. Any former shock patient who endorses it is a member.
Membership imposes no duties or dues, but every endorsement stregthens the patient voice.
And since we were bound together by agreement on the fundamental of the shock experience, we could operate without elected officers. Any member who chose to be active could speak, write, or deal with the FDA in the name of all. With only such an informal kind of organization, we managed for six years to forestall action toward reclassification. Regardless of when or in what direction the FDA may move, the CTIP is continuing to work for truthfully informed consent. The problem we alone address is that patients throughout the country are routinely misinformed and misled as to the results to be expected from shock treatment.