Ketamine Essay

Chronic intake, the delayed onset of action, drug resistance and numerous side effects force the researchers to look for the new, safe antidepressant strategies (1, 2) with rapid onset and longer time of action.

Individuals all over the world suffer with clinical depression, which affect their quality of life. Depression usually affects a person’s emotions, thoughts, behaviors and overall physical health. Symptoms include sadness, guilt, moodiness, loss of interest, with drawling from people, changes in sleep, decrease in sex drive, and thoughts of self-harm or suicide. The common antidepressants take at least a two-week period to take effect; that two-week period is a critical time where a patient can increase their symptoms and experience suicidal depression. The party drug, known as ketamine has recently made a big impression for neuroscientists trying to formulate a medication to help those who suffer from clinical depression in a rapid time frame. A key element in the advancement for faster medications is realizing how and why, ketamine works so quickly, in comparison to the other generic drugs that are prescribed. According to Newport, a dose of the nonselective N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor antagonist ketamine can produce a constant antidepressant effect within hours. With the amount of experiments being conducted to expand the knowledge of ketamine, the objective is to find a solution that can be used to relieve the patients who experience serious symptoms in the fastest time possible.

Ionescu et al. (2015) examined the use of ketamine to treat bipolar depression. Ketamine is an anesthetic drug. Lately, there has been a lot of research into possible treatment of several psychological disorders using sub-anesthetic levels of ketamine. Recent research has shown ketamine to be effective at treating depression in patients with treatment resistant bipolar I and bipolar II. Ionescu et al. (2015) examined if the antidepressant effects of ketamine in bipolar patients, was lessened if they had comorbid anxiety. This study was part of a larger, double blind, placebo controlled study, which examined the safety of using ketamine with mood stabilizers. The participants in this study were split into two groups, those with comorbid anxiety, and those without. All participants received

Description: Ketamine is a nonbarbiturate, sedative hypnotic used parenterally to provide anesthesia for short diagnostic and surgical procedures. It is also used as an inducing agent, as an adjunct to supplement low-potency anesthetics such as nitrous oxide, and as a supplement to local and regional anesthesia. Ketamine can be used concomitantly with muscle relaxants without complication because it does not provide muscle relaxation of its own. It is a fairly short-acting agent that provides a profound, rapid, dissociative state and a short recovery time.

Pharmaceuticals are a very popular method of curing depression. Although they are popular these drugs show little to no progress in curing depression. In the article, "Taking Anti-Depressant Medication: A Qualitative Examination of Internet Postings,” proves this. The article gives accounts of multiple patients who have taken the medication and recorded their results. One patient states, “It seems like I’m about five times as anxious/depressed as I was pre-Paroxetine”. (353). Research proves that pharmaceuticals do not help individuals with their depression, but in fact cause it to worsen. The studies shows that many individuals receive a

Ketamine has been tested in treatment-resistant bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, and people in a suicidal crisis in emergency rooms. Benefit is often of a short duration. The quality of the evidence supporting benefit is generally

With an estimated 9.3% of Americans currently living with major depression or bipolar disorder, according to the NIMH, the safety of antidepressant drugs is at the forefront of many pharmaceutical discussions. At present, the most common drugs used to treat the debilitating lethargy, anxiety, and fatigue often associated with major depression fall into three key categories based upon mechanism of action: SSRIs, Tricyclics, and MAOIs. Since major depression and bipolar disorder are characterized by imbalances of certain chemicals within the brain, prescription medications are often the best way of relieving the symptoms of these disorders. As with any medication, antidepressants carry risks of side-effects, which usually relate to the drug

Ketamine (Ketamine Hydrochloride) is a drug that has been used for many decades, since 1963 as an anesthetic. It is the most preferred anesthetic compound since it can induce anesthesia in 1-2 minutes after administration. It also maintains homeostasis during the time that the patient is unconscious. Recent breakthroughs in research have proven its use as a rapid anti-depressant in patients suffering from Treatment Resistant Depression and has been considered a miracle. It can alleviate the symptoms of depression within hours of being administered at a low dosage and its effects are long lasting as well. Even though several drugs have been invented for treating depression, depression

The history of antidepressants began with isoniazid, which was an anti-tuberculosis medication. This came after finding that the medication had euphoric effects on the patients taking it. The drug had a mood altering side effect which later became the primary effect for depression and was a basis for synthesis of generations of new antidepressants (Indian J Psychiatry, 2011). Antidepressants are psychiatric medications given to patients with depressive disorders to alleviate symptoms (MNT, 2012). Neurotransmitters in the brain can cause changes in mood and behavior, antidepressants can help correct these chemical imbalances. Many psychiatric conditions can be treated with antidepressants including anxiety disorders and dysthymia. According to medicalnewstoday.com, there were 13.3 million people using antidepressants in 1996 by 2010 that number jumped to 23.3 million. The website goes on to say they believe the increase in antidepressant use can be credited to a higher need for mental health treatments, campaigns promoting mental health care being more widespread and mental health treatments becoming more widely accepted. In the years since the antidepressant age came to be many new antidepressants have been made, the Royal College of Psychiatrist say there are at least thirty different kinds of antidepressants, all of which can be divided into five main types.

TCAs, SSRIs, SNRIs, SRMs, MAOIs and Lithium Salts) providing a variable range of options that help in considering patients’ preferences along with overcoming antidepressants tolerance and resistance issues. Nevertheless, despite the availability of more than two dozens different antidepressants, these treatments often yield inadequate results, for instance; up to 70% of patients with MDD (Major Depressive Disorder) do not reach remission with an adequate course of one antidepressant and experience poorer long-term outcomes (Fava 2003).The failures and shortcomings of classical antidepressants are usually rationalized through illustrating the hypothesis of their

The selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor and the tricyclic antidepressant have shown superiority over the benzodiazepines, monoamine-oxidase inhibitor in term of effectiveness and tolerance.

Antidepressants have shown effectiveness in the long-term treatment of GAD, as well as providing therapeutic effects without compromising the safety of the individual, as compared to Benzodiazepines. One class of antidepressants used to treat GAD is the Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI). These SSRIs work by inhibiting the reuptake of the neurotransmitter serotonin, which affects mood regulation. With the help of SSRI, “the serotonin stays in the synaptic gap longer than it normally would, and may repeatedly stimulate the receptors of the recipient cell” (Goodman et al., 2011) As such, with the increase of serotonin, it aids in the induction of mood-elevating and contributes to the therapeutic anti-anxiety effects of SSRIs. Some of the common drugs prescribed under the SSRI class are Venlafaxine, Escitalopram, Paroxetine and Duloxetine. These drugs have their adverse effects with sexual dysfunction being the most common. Other adverse effects include gastrointestinal effects such as nausea, diarrhoea, dry mouth and constipation, along with occurrences of sleep disturbances. (Khawam, Laurencic & Malone Jr.,

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The linkage of serotonin to depression has been known for the past five years. From numerous studies, the most concrete evidence of this connection is the decreased concentration of serotonin metabolites like 5-HIAA (5-hydroxyindole acetic acid) in the cerebrospinal fluid and brain tissues of depressed people. If depression, as suggested, is a result of decreased levels of serotonin in the brain, pharmaceutical agents that can reverse this effect should be helpful in treating depressed patients. Therefore, the primary targets of various antidepressant medications are serotonin transports of the brain. Since serotonin is activated when released by neurons into the synapse, antidepressants function at the synapse to enhance serotonin activity. Normally, serotonin's actions in the synapse are terminated by its being taken back into the neuron then releases it at which point "it is either recycled for reuse as a transmitter or broken down into its metabolic by products and transported out of the brain." As a result, antidepressants work to increase serotonin levels at the synapse by blocking serotonin reuptake (2).

In a study by Morein-Zamir et al. in 2007, modafinil was discovered to improve short and