Ketamine solution poured onto glass and left to dry. Photograph Source: Coaster420 – Public Domain Clinics offering ketamine infusions and injections for “treatment-resistant depression” are today claiming 24-48 hours remission, and ketamine is also being marketed for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), obsessive-compulsive disorder, bipolar disorder, and anxiety disorder.
“Between 500 and 750 ketamine clinics have cropped up across the United States,” NPR reported early in 2024 (“The Ketamine Economy: New Mental Health Clinics are a ‘Wild West’ with Few Rules”). This may be an underestimation, as Psychiatric News reported later in 2024, “More than 1,500 intravenous (IV) infusion clinics have proliferated nationwide.” Ketamine industry revenues of $3.1 billion were reported in 2022, and projected to be $6.9 billion by 2030.
All this has occurred despite the fact that the Food and Drug Administration has warned : “Ketamine is not FDA approved for the treatment of any psychiatric disorder.”
“Special K” is one of many slang names for ketamine, which is termed by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) as a “dissociative anesthetic hallucinogen” that “distorts the perception of sight and sound and makes the user feel disconnected and not in control”—an experience that on the street is referred to as the “K-hole.”
The mainstream media reports little about ketamine’s scientific reality but a great deal about celebrity ketamine users’ testimonials and deaths. So the U.S. public has heard about Elon Musk’s praise of ketamine for his depression; and about Matthew Perry’s tragedy , which began with clinic treatment, then illegal ketamine acquisition, multiple-injections-a-day addiction , and finally death with an autopsy determining that he had died from “the acute effects of ketamine.”
All this begs some questions: (1) Why would psychiatry turn to ketamine, a “club drug” that is used by drug risk takers hoping for a euphoric out-of-body experience, used by predators to facilitate sexual assault, and is not approved by the FDA for any psychiatric disorder? (2) What do scientific studies — not enthusiasts’ anecdotal reports — actually tell us about ketamine as a psychiatric treatment? (3) What is a sane approach to so-called “treatment-resistant depression”?
Why Psychiatry is Turning to Ketamine: A […]
Psychiatry’s Latest Insane Magic-Bullet Treatment for Depression: Why Ketamine?
