[mojo2]

Injection appears to give speedy depression relief
By Shankar Vedantam
The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — Government researchers announced Monday that they have had striking success in treating depression in a matter of hours, using an experimental injectable drug that acts much more quickly than conventional antidepressants.

The study, based on a small sample, is part of a push by researchers to develop treatments that can bring quick relief to patients with mental disorders. Patients and their doctors report it often takes weeks or months for most available antidepressants to improve symptoms.

Much more work needs to be done before patients can see benefits from the breakthrough, the researchers said. Among the unanswered questions are whether patients will be able to tolerate the drug for long periods, and whether it will continue to be effective.

Researchers said they hope the finding will prompt the pharmaceutical industry to develop similar compounds with fewer side effects that can then be tested on a large scale.

"Psychiatrists have gotten used to the idea we have to wait weeks or months, but we can break the sound barrier and get an antidepressant effect within hours," said Dr. Carlos Zarate Jr., chief of the mood-disorders research unit at the National Institute of Mental Health.

Zarate and his colleagues published a paper about their findings in Monday's issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.

In the study, 18 patients were injected with a drug called ketamine, which has long been used as an anesthetic. Patients briefly experienced a well-known side effect of the drug — a mild feeling of dissociation, where they felt disconnected or found it difficult to put thoughts into words.

Ketamine is a controlled substance and can produce mild euphoria.

But the dissociative symptoms disappeared within a couple of hours, and shortly afterward, patients and physicians reported a dramatic improvement in mood. Half the patients had a 50 percent decline in depression symptoms, and by the end of the first day, 71 percent reported a similar improvement. More than a third continued to report such a benefit after seven days, and nearly a third reported a complete end of symptoms.

Conventional antidepressants approach those kinds of numbers only after eight to 10 weeks of treatment.

"We can truly raise the bar on what we can expect of antidepressant treatments," said Thomas Insel, director of the NIMH. "A modest response after six weeks is what we used to define as success. What I love about this project is it redefines success not in terms of weeks, but in terms of hours."

Rather than go after the conventional targets of serotonin and norepinephrine, the new drug targets an entirely different neurotransmitter in the brain called glutamate.

"This is not a subtle change," Insel added. "It is almost like rebooting a computer. It is a chemical reboot and the striking thing is the effect lasts for about a week."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...depress08.html

[screamingFit]

What the article fails to mention is that it's the street drug "Special K" that they're injecting into patients.

[Kevin]

Injection appears to give speedy depression relief

Women have known this for centuries.

[mojo2]

Originally Posted by Kevin

Women have known this for centuries.

GREAT FRIGGIN LINE!!!!

Kevin, that shows why...

You Da Man!

[Landos Mustache]

So is this something they would do once and a while for special circumstances or do you need daily shots?

[mojo2]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

So is this something they would do once and a while for special circumstances or do you need daily shots?

Some women want it multiple times a day. Whereas others are happy with a couple times a week.

"This is not a subtle change," Insel added. "It is almost like rebooting a computer. It is a chemical reboot and the striking thing is the effect lasts for about a week."

[Mastrap]

Ketamine is used as a horse tranquilizer.

[DeathToWindows]

I saw this recently... scares the **** out of me. I've seen Ketamine effects... not pretty..

[mojo2]

Originally Posted by DeathToWindows

I saw this recently... scares the **** out of me. I've seen Ketamine effects... not pretty..

Are you thinking of this?

In the study, 18 patients were injected with a drug called ketamine, which has long been used as an anesthetic. Patients briefly experienced a well-known side effect of the drug — a mild feeling of dissociation, where they felt disconnected or found it difficult to put thoughts into words.

Ketamine is a controlled substance and can produce mild euphoria.

For those of us who get it really bad I wonder if the Ketamine "dissociation" wouldn't be tolerable if the result was...

But the dissociative symptoms disappeared within a couple of hours, and shortly afterward, patients and physicians reported a dramatic improvement in mood. Half the patients had a 50 percent decline in depression symptoms, and by the end of the first day, 71 percent reported a similar improvement. More than a third continued to report such a benefit after seven days, and nearly a third reported a complete end of symptoms.

Where do I sign up?

[slugslugslug]

Too bad I don't still know people who do this for fun. I'd read the study and give it a whirl..

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Mastrap

Ketamine is used as a horse tranquilizer.

I thought it was for cats?

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

I thought it was for cats?

You're both right!

Originally Posted by wikipedia

In veterinary medicine, ketamine is often used for its anaesthetic and analgesic effects on cats, dogs, rabbits, rats, and other small animals. Veterinarians often use ketamine with sedative drugs to produce balanced anaesthesia and analgesia, and as a constant rate infusion to help prevent pain wind-up. Ketamine is used to manage pain among horses and other large animals, though it has less effect on bovines.

Ketamine

Also from that article:

When used recreationally, ketamine can be known as K, Ket, Special K, Vitamin K (not to be confused with the true vitamin K), Smack K, Kit-Kat, Keller, Barry Keddle, HOSS, The Hoos, Hossalar, kurdamin, Wonk, Regreta and tranq.
Ketamine produces effects similar to PCP and DXM. Like other dissociative anesthetics in low- to upper-middle dosages, its hallucinogenic effects are only seen against a background lacking sensory stimulation, such as darkness. Users tout its trip is as good or better than that of PCP or LSD because its overt hallucinatory effects are short-acting, lasting an hour or less in most cases. Effects on the senses, judgment, and coordination, however, can last for 18 to 24 hours. Standing up and moving may be more dangerous than lying still in one place.

Sounds like some potent stuff!

[OB1]

"a mild feeling of dissociation, where they felt disconnected or found it difficult to put thoughts into words."
- That's pretty much my experience of Ketamine. A pleasant experience, although I wouldn't call it euphoric. It was a few years ago now, and I wasn't depressed before I took it.

If you are depressed, and thinking of giving it a try, there are worse ways to spend an afternoon than feeling like you're wrapped up in cotton wool for a couple of hours

[Monique]

For me before you get too much drugs in your system, you should go and take a walk, look around you and see real misery, get therapy, you never know with drugs if you actually are better or it is the drugs.