How Ketamine Infusion Therapy Can Help Treat Ptsd
Ketamine, through infusion therapy, has made its way to becoming one of the newest and most effective trends in treating chronic physical and neurological irregularities. It is known to be highly effective in treating depression, neurologic and mood irregularities, chronic pain syndromes, and substance abuse dependency as compared to more traditional forms of treatment.
Ketamine Infusion for PTSD
One of the best applications of ketamine infusion is for the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder . In a gist, the onset of this psychological disorder, according to the NIMH, occurs when an individual experiences a particularly shocking, scary, or dangerous event. When the cause is extreme or repeated enough times, it can trigger an intense psychological reaction akin to a fight-or-flight response even without an obvious stimulus.
PTSD is more commonly associated with members of the military, especially after having undergone a war or operation. While servicemen are the most common patients, this actually affects more than 8 million Americans, with trauma ranging from physical or mental abuse, near-death experiences, sexual abuse, and other traumatic events. However, we now know that PTSD is 4.5 times more common in women than men, and the causes can be totally unrelated to military experience.
The Benefits of Ketamine Therapy for PTSD
Reorganizes brain circuitry
Helps face the trauma
How Does Ketamine Help Ptsd
Are you reliving a traumatic situation from your past? Have you tried treatments but found no relief? If so, you might be a good candidate for ketamine.
Here, at Klarity Clinic, our highly trained team of doctors and staff have created ground-breaking protocols in the use of ketamine. We offer treatment for everything. From major depression, severe anxiety to post-traumatic stress disorder , and more.
Over 85% of our patients have found relief, thanks to ketamine treatments. We work hard to provide our patients with the best possible results and the highest level of satisfaction.
How To Try It
Talk with mental health care professional or primary care doctor if youre interested in trying ketamine for depression, says Yalda Safai, MD, a New York-based psychiatrist at Pasithea Clinics. They can help you decide if ketamine is right for you and refer you to a professional who specializes in ketamine therapy.
You can find freestanding clinics and online services that offer ketamine, but Safai cautions that many of them dont offer adequate supervision.
This is dangerous, as its important to be monitored for side effects by a nurse or doctor during the treatment, she says.
Again, oral ketamine tablets are the only form of ketamine you can take at home. Your prescribing clinician will likely recommend having a friend, partner, or other trusted person present when you take them, just in case you experience any uncomfortable side effects or a negative reaction.
If you do try a ketamine clinic on your own, the American Society of Ketamine Physicians, Psychotherapists, and Practitioners recommends making sure it meets the following criteria:
- Its been open for more than 2 years.
- It has board-certified physicians with mental health experience on staff.
- It offers additional mental health support services, such as individual or group therapy.
- Youre required to complete at least one or two consultations before starting ketamine therapy.
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What Is An Antagonist
Agonists and antagonists are chemicals that bind to the receptor sites of specific neurotransmitters. An antagonist binds to the receptor and then stops that neurotransmitter from binding and sending a signal.
Remember that the process of neurotransmission is a bit like a lock-and-key: the right neurotransmitters can only bind with the right receptor sites on the post-synaptic neuron . Neurotransmitters bind to specific receptors and send signals to the next neuron.
Neurotransmitters have an effect by binding to receptor sites on the post-synaptic neuron. This is how the chemical and electrical signals are sent throughout neural networks in the brain.
Receiving Ketamine For Ptsd
There is a process to receiving ketamine for PTSD. It begins with a consultation with a psychiatrist. If you dont already have one trained and certified to administer ketamine, call The Mental Health Center. You will discuss your physical and mental health history in the consultation and take lab tests to test for liver functionality and other substances.
Once you qualify and are ready for your first treatment, you will be placed in a calm and relaxing environment in the clinical setting. You may choose to listen to music or sit quietly. Your doctor will prepare your ketamine dose based on your weight.
Ketamine is administered via three options: intravenously, a shot directly into your muscle or using a nasal spray. Throughout the 45 minutes of treatment, a nurse will monitor your vital signs.
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Special Considerations In Using Ketamine For Ptsd
If someone has an active substance abuse disorder, then it will be better to get treatment for this prior to undergoing ketamine infusions. Although there is some research for ketamine in actually treating substance use disorders, it can complicate the infusion treatment. If an individual continues to abuse a substance, this can impair the effectiveness of the ketamine infusions to treat PTSD.
Often patients with PTSD are treated with benzodiazepines to address their anxiety. This class of medications could actually decrease the effectiveness of the ketamine infusion. That being said however, there are many clinics which may provide these medications during the infusion to minimize the dissociative effects which they view as side effects. We believe the dissociative non-ordinary states of consciousness to be essential and transformative for the healing process.
If an individual with PTSD has active delusions and hallucinations, ketamine should be avoided. The ketamine induced non-ordinary states of consciousness could potentially enhance or worsen delusions and active hallucinations.
How Does Ketamine Infusion Therapy Work
Our team of medical experts offers ketamine infusion and pain management treatments in a safe and comfortable setting.
Ketamine has traditionally been used as an anesthetic for medical treatments and procedures. Unlike other forms of anesthesia, ketamine doesnt slow your breathing or other circulatory functions.
The infusion is administered through an IV at our office under the supervision of our medical staff. The experience can be compared to getting a dental procedure with mild to moderate sedation, so youll want to arrange for someone to pick you up and drive you home after your infusion.
Everyone is different, so the number of infusions youll need depends on your symptoms, health profile, and circumstances.
Ketamine infusions are generally recommended for PTSD after more conservative treatment options have failed or provided only limited relief. After a comprehensive evaluation and medical history, our medical team will help you determine if ketamine infusions can help with your PTSD symptoms. If so, we will recommend a personalized treatment plan unique to your needs.
For more information about ketamine infusion therapy and how it can help manage your PTSD symptoms, contact Republic Spine and Pain today to schedule an appointment at one of our two convenient locations in Austin and Georgetown, Texas.
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Can I Afford Ketamine Infusion Therapy
Ketamine treatment plans are very individualized and there are several different protocols, just for depression. Through detailed phone consultation and intake with Dr. Harris, we support each client in making the choice of protocol that is perfect for them. We can share the differences in pricing of these different protocols during our first phone consultation.
At NeuroRelief, the initial treatment plan we recommend for new clients is to come in for 6 treatment days over a 2-3 week period of time. This is the latest medical consensus of best initial practices for best initial results, called the Stabilization Protocol.
Please see our Affordability page for detailed information on our 15-month interest-free financing program and our robust superbill reimbursement services.
Other Conditions
Is Ketamine Assisted Therapy For Ptsd Safe
When used in a supervised setting at appropriate doses, Ketamine therapy is safer and more effective than many traditional treatments for PTSD. You can be confident that your Ketamine journey will be optimized with the support and guidance of our fully trained health professionals. Our health centers are designed to offer you a feeling of safety and comfort, and we have medical protocols in place to ensure your safety throughout your experience with us.
To maximize the benefits and reduce the risks of Ketamine assisted therapy for PTSD, itâs important that your journey takes place in a safe, controlled setting guided by trained experts committed to ensuring your health and comfort. Field Trip Health providers are professionally trained and licensed medical practitioners including experienced physicians and psychiatrists, registered psychotherapists, and licensed nurse practitioners, and your therapy will take place in a health center designed specifically to optimize your therapeutic experience.
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Do You Find Yourself Dealing With These Ptsd Symptoms
- Overreacting to normal daily stresses. Stimuli can be much more overwhelming than youd like .
- Road rage or driving anxiety. Any task requiring driving has become significantly more stressful.
- Trouble maintaining romantic relationships. Fights feel frequent and unavoidable. Unfortunately, break-ups, separations, and divorces are extremely common with sufferers of PTSD.
- Trouble keeping healthy relationships with friends and family. You may find yourself declining social interactions even with people you love.
- Being overwhelmed by children. High-energy and needy children are especially challenging, even when you want to interact well with them.
- Constantly thinking about suicide. Pre-treatment, many of our clients felt so crushed by suicidal thoughts that it felt like the only mode of escape.
- Panic attacks and anxiety attacks. From tingling hands to completely shutting down, attacks keep you from the tasks you want to do.
- Struggling to manage your job. Its hard to keep a job or keep up what it requires. Work instability has become a major stress in your life.
These are the kinds of symptoms that bring our clients in to try IV ketamine. Thankfully, theyre the symptoms that ketamine therapy works well for.
Having Thoughts Of Suicide
If youre thinking about suicide, know youre not alone.
You can get free, confidential support 24/7 from trained crisis counselors by dialing 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
If you prefer text-based support, just text HOME to 741-741 to reach the Crisis Text Line.
it plays a key role in mood regulation. Low levels of glutamate in your brain may lead to depression symptoms.
Ketamine can also stimulate the production of brain-derived neurotrophic factor , Eriksson says. This protein plays a role in neuroplasticity, or your brains ability to adapt as you experience new things. By supporting neuroplasticity, ketamine may help change negative thought patterns that contribute to depression.
Another major advantage lies in the fact that ketamine works very quickly, Eriksson says. With traditional antidepressants, it may take weeks before you notice improvement in your symptoms. Ketamine may offer relief in as little as
Ketamine comes in many different forms, including:
You can only receive esketamine nasal spray, IV therapy, and IM injections at a clinic or hospital. This allows healthcare professionals to monitor your response and any side effects you experience.
According to Eriksson, IV therapy is one of the most widely studied forms of ketamine in part because the treatment professional has more control over the dosage during treatment. However, Spravato nasal spray remains the only FDA-approved ketamine therapy, to date.
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Is Ketamine Right For You
As long as you are healthy and have been clinically diagnosed with PTSD, you may benefit from ketamine. Men and women with heart disease, hyperthyroidism, or bladder dysfunction may not be able to take ketamine. If you have underlying health conditions, Dr. Ghorieshi recommends that you go to your primary care physician for a physical examination to get cleared for ketamine treatment.
If youve been struggling to find for relief from PTSD, contact Dr. Ghorieshi at Palo Alto Center for Mind Body Health. In addition to helping you with ketamine, Dr. Ghorieshi and our team at Palo Alto emphasize whole-body and whole-mind healing that goes beyond symptom relief to improve your overall quality of life. You can phone our office or use the online form to book a consultation.
How Much Does It Cost
Since the Spravato nasal spray is the only FDA-approved treatment at this time, insurance companies often wont cover other forms though they may cover other types of ketamine treatment in cases of very severe depression, according to Lagoy.
The cost of other types of ketamine therapy can vary, depending on where you live, what form and dose you take, and other factors.
The cost of 1 month of Spravato treatment may run as high as $6,800, if you receive treatment twice a week. That said, insurance programs may offer some support with covering the cost of Spravato.
A single IV ketamine infusion can cost $400 or more, according to Eriksson.
Ketamine continues to gather interest as a potential treatment for depression, especially treatment-resistant depression.
That said, research on the benefits of ketamine for depression remains relatively new.
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How Does Ketamine Help With Ptsd
Ketamine works by antagonizing NMDA receptors and stimulating the AMPA receptors responsible for the increased production of new receptors in the brain. For patients suffering from PTSD, this process of generating new connections between neurons is often affected.
Ketamine treatment can be of great relief to patients suffering from PTSD by alleviating some of the symptoms, such as anxiety and a loss of interest in things that one enjoys. Ketamine treatment for depression is quite effective because the infusion works fast sometimes within hours.
Can Ketamine Assisted Therapy Help Treat My Ptsd
Over the past two decades, clinical research has demonstrated that when administered at low doses in a controlled setting, Ketamine works rapidly, effectively, and safely to improve symptoms in people living with depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder . Ketamine therapy is an especially important option for people living with PTSD, as traditional pharmacotherapies and talk therapies often fall short of providing both the rapid relief and long-term healing needed to keep trauma from becoming a chronic fixture in the brain. Ketamine therapy works by altering the brainâs response to traumatic memories by rewiring the way that regions of the brain communicate with one another, which can help people living with PTSD develop a healthier approach to traumatic triggers and persistent invasive thoughts. Especially in combination with psychotherapy, Ketamine has the power to help people living with PTSD live fuller lives by transforming their relationship to the past and giving them the confidence to face the future.
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Search Strategy And Inclusion Criteria
This meta-analysis and systematic review were registered with PROSPERO and followed the preferred reporting project for systematic reviews and meta-analysis recommendations .
A detailed systematic review of the following databases was performed from inception to 23 May 2021: Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Embase, PubMed, and Web of Science. The following search terms were used for PubMed: AND . Randomized controlled trials , case-control studies, and cohort studies were included. Both dichotomous and continuous variables were separately included.
How Does Ketamine Work On Ptsd
Ketamine acts differently from other medications such as SSRIs, tricyclics, MAOI inhibitors, benzodiazepines, and other antidepressant or anti-anxiety medications. Ketamine infusions result in the structural re-wiring of neural pathways, not just a superficial band-aid.
Unlike the 6-12 weeks with other common medications, Ketamine-mediated synaptic plasticity changes appear to occur within a matter of minutes to hours after ketamine administration!
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Ketamine Pharmacotherapy And Mechanism Of Action
Ketamine has been traditionally used as an alternative to general anesthesia. It produces dissociation between the thalamaco-neocortical and limbic systems.6 This dissociation is thought to be both functional and electrophysiological in nature. Clinically, individuals given ketamine exhibit a state of catalepsy in which the eyes remain open and have a slow nystagmus.6 During this state, the individuals maintain corneal and light reflexes.6 Patients become flaccid, but are awake. Ketamine doses here tend to be higher than those used in the MDD management. Minor central nervous system changes have been reported and include disruption of an individuals ability to understand the environment and organize thoughts leading to emergence delirium or psychosis.7
Ketamine activity occurs at the N-methyl-D-aspartate-type glutamate receptor as an antagonist.8,9 It has been studied in greater detail recently due to its potential use as an antidepressant agent.10 NMDA receptor activation has been shown to increase formation of spontaneous intrusive memories , and high activity of the NMDA receptor may be a risk factor for actually developing PTSD.11 As ketamine functions as an antagonist to the NMDA receptor, it may be a promising drug target to lower PTSD symptoms as such.
Childhood Trauma And Ketamine
Childhood trauma was long known to affect adult levels of depression and anxiety. But only recently has childhood trauma been definitively proven with scientific methods to leave long-lasting scars into adulthood. Childhood trauma makes any mental illness worse and makes any treatments less successful. Through our partnership with Baylor College of Medicine Psychiatry Department and their ongoing research, we were able to help add more information to this critical area of psychiatry study.
With our QIDS and Childhood Trauma Questionnaire data, our research partners at Baylor were able to recognize that, in general, patients with high levels of childhood trauma are more difficult to effectively treat. Those patients with high childhood trauma, and especially emotional neglect, consistently had greater levels of depression severity throughout treatment.
However, the good news was that even though it is harder to see a result those patients still responded strongly to ketamine infusions. They experienced a decrease of their symptoms and even better they had the same low remission rates as patients without childhood trauma. A further interesting finding was that the remission rates of patients with childhood trauma were actually improved with the ketamine infusions relative to similar patients using only typical antidepressants.
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