A single dose of IV ketamine reduces suicidal thoughts within one day and for up to one week
A single dose of IV ketamine reduces suicidal thoughts within one day and for up to one week
Objective: Suicide is a public health crisis with limited treatment options. The authors conducted a systematic review and individual participant data meta-analysis examining the effects of a single dose of ketamine on suicidal ideation. Method: Individual participant data were obtained from 10 of 1...
Why this is significant: There is no currently known treatment to stop suicidal thoughts when they happen. Antidepressants take 4-6 weeks to start working, and they don't work for everyone. Therapy also takes time. Our best option for acutely suicidal people is to lock them up in a psychiatric facility until they are no longer a threat to themselves.
Intravenous ketamine offers a glimpse of hope. A single dose appears able to alleviate suicidal ideation immediately after administration and for up to a week afterwards.
Going off of antidepressants also causes suicidal ideation, so they're not exactly great.
Yes, and even getting on them can induce suicidal ideation, especially in some children and teenagers. It's rare, but that doesn't fucking matter if it happens to your child.
What’s great about NMDA receptor antagonism is that it is shown to have a more lasting impact on patients vs traditional treatment. So not only does it help stop suicidal ideation, as seen here, a single dose can stop it for up to a week.
Spravato offers patients a much higher chance of achieving remission than any other treatment resistant depression regimen available, knowing that it actually stops the suicidal ideation as soon as you administer it is key in developing medication that completely eradicates suicidal ideation.
In the meantime you can enjoy Auvelity, a drug that combines the antidepressant Bupropion with the famous OTC cough suppressant dextromethorphan in order to benefit from its hidden NMDA antagonist activity that is only found at long lasting concentrations through bupropions induction of CYP2D6.
In the future we hopefully won’t be using drugs initially invented for cough suppression, and find a much more targeted approach thanks to the new NMDA pathway for treatment resistant depression.
Also this was found to be true already with Intranasal Spray. The article explores a much more strong handed approach via IV administration rather than through a nasal spray.