Our mental health is as valuable as our physical, emotional, and spiritual health. That is why when it is unstable, there are specific therapies and medications helpful in addressing mental health problems such as anxiety, depression, PTSD, etc. However, not everyone embraces new ways of treating various mental health problems. Others still believe that traditional ones are more efficient and safe. But Ketamine Therapy will prove you wrong as it works on 65-75% of the population than conventional medications that work only on 25-40%. We do not want you to disregard your mental health so sit with us as we discuss Ketamine Therapy further.
What is Ketamine Therapy?
Ketamine Therapy is an off-label use of Ketamine that relieves treatment-resistant depression, post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD, chronic pain, and anxiety. It is recommended that a patient is referred for Ketamine Therapy. If a patient continues, the acute phase of the treatment requires six to ten sessions scheduled in several weeks.
What is Ketamine?
The World Health Organization listed Ketamine as one of the essential medicines because of its high-level safety and versatility when utilized in anesthesia in 1985. According to sources, Ketamine is often used as an indispensable medication in low-income countries. Eventually, the substance is also discovered to be efficient as an antidepressant and a treatment for chronic pain control.
Ketamine started in Belgium in the 1960s as animals anesthesia. The Food and Drug Administration approved it as a human anesthetic in 1970. It is said that Ketamine was used in treating soldiers during the Vietnam War. An expert mentioned that someone was trying to jump off a bridge, and they were given Ketamine to calm down. Nine months later, the patient testified that they were not suicidal for nine months already.
How does Ketamine become a treatment for depression?
Ketamine works by releasing glutamate – a type of neurotransmitter. This process produces a growth factor that aids in brain damage repair caused by mental illness or stress. It is said that Ketamine can make people feel better within a few hours or days. Additionally, it regenerates nerve cells in time. With all these being said, Ketamine’s mechanism of action is different from other antidepressant medications.
What are various forms of Ketamine?
Ketamine comes in different forms when administered to patients. The Food and Drug Administration approved Spravato, or a nasal spray called esketamine, a medication for depression. It is most suitable for adults whose antidepressants have not helped. Patients will receive esketamine at a clinic where their medical professionals will watch over them for two hours after the dose.
Patients commonly get the nasal spray twice a week for one to four weeks, once a week for five to nine weeks, and once every week or two after the previous series.
Some administer Ketamine through an IV infusion, lozenges, and shot in the arms, but the FDA does not approve these forms. You can get an IV shot only at your provider’s office. Some doctors also prescribe lozenges for at-home usage to keep depression controlled before another infusion session.
There are also booster Ketamine Therapies which are recommended every month or a few times per year, depending on the patient’s need.
How does Ketamine Therapy work?
Once the Ketamine is administered in the body, you will most likely experience disassociated effects, but this is only part of the treatment. Your doctors will watch closely how your brain responds to the substance.
Your brain may react in several ways depending on what it was to begin with. Patients with long-term depression will lose some synapses or the vital connections in their brains that allow communication between nerve cells.
Moreover, research claims that these lost connections will start to regrow within 24 hours of the first dose of Ketamine. The more synapse regrowth occurs, the more the efficiency of Ketamine as an antidepressant manifests.
What happens after Ketamine Therapy?
You may notice positive effects half an hour after Ketamine Therapy, depending on the treatment intensity. More improvements will begin several hours after the treatment. Before your first therapy, you will fill out a few questionnaires to let your provider have a record of your progress after every session. In this way, they can adjust the treatment intensity based on your current needs to maximize the benefits and minimize possible side effects.
What are the side effects of Ketamine Therapy?
Aside from disassociated effects, Ketamine also produces short-lived and intense subjective experience, which elicits an afterglow followed by a positive change in development, cognition, motivation, and behavior. These subjective or “mystical” experiences give profound, rapid, and sustained shifts in mood, behavior, insight, and consciousness. All of these were first used by other healing rituals and indigenous cultures in the shamanic.
Longevity of results and cost
When it comes to the longevity of results, an infusion’s effect can last up to two weeks. However, some patients specifically stay symptom-free for several months after a series of six infusions.
Usually, the price for Ketamine Therapy ranges from $400-$900, depending on your chosen medical spa and financial plans. Insurance companies also cover Ketamine Therapy only in the form of the FDA-approved nasal spray Spravato. Experts have said that some people will not afford a series of Ketamine Therapies that will cost a total of $3,000-$4,000. However, they do not recommend stopping in the middle of the series because this will significantly change the overall improvement. Despite this, doctors do not recommend changing methods for Ketamine Therapy for the sake of finishing it. If you have started with tablets, you must complete it.
We care for your mental health and how it deters your everyday life. Get a Ketamine Therapy in A Better Solution where you will realize that Ketamine is indeed a better solution! While they assist you in achieving wellness for improved mental health, they will succeed in giving a quality service.
Located in Marco Island, Florida, contact the best solution for your mental health today and try Ketamine Therapy for yourself!
