Southwest Florida's Health and Wellness Magazine Health and Wellness Articles
IV Ketamine Treatment is the Alternative Method Helping Numerous Individuals
Over the past ten years, Ketamine has been studied in patients with severe depression. A rapid instantaneous effect takes place immediately upon the drug being dispensed intravenously. Due to the outcomes, there has been a lot of buzz in the news lately about IV Ketamine therapy for treating treatment-resistant depression as well other mental health disorders such as PTSD, OCD, and phobias. We can now add Social Anxiety Disorder to the list. For people who suffer from social anxiety, its effects can be crippling. Everyday interactions may cause such distress in these people that it interferes with opportunities for employment, healthy positive interactions with friends and family, and for students, not being able to reach their full academic potential in the classroom. These people may exhibit physical manifestations of their anxiety in the form of sweaty palms, high blood pressure, and a racing heart. Over an extended period of time, these symptoms not only cause mental anguish but also affect one’s overall physical health.
The standard treatments up to now have been antidepressants, anxiolytics, and behavioral therapy. For up to 50% of patients, these are ineffective in treating their social anxiety adequately. Recently, the results of a double-blind, placebo-controlled study with 18 patients diagnosed with Social Anxiety Disorder using IV Ketamine was published in The Journal of Neuropharmacology. What they found was that people responded to Ketamine. They had significantly less anxiety, which lasted up to 28 days. Patients, who received one IV Ketamine infusion, had less social anxiety, avoidance, and fear when compared to patients who received a placebo. For patients that have not responded to more conventional treatment, IV Ketamine can hold a great deal of promise.
Debilitating Migraine Headaches
Migraine headaches affect 12 % of the population. Of these, 75% of the patients are women. Symptoms of migraines include persistent throbbing headaches often associated with sensitivity to light, sound as well as nausea and vomiting. Often times, migraines are controlled with different classes of medications, nerve blocks, relaxation therapies and even Botox injections. For patients
who have not received adequate relief from these conventional treatments, they are termed intractable migraines sufferers.
A recent study conducted at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital involved 61 patients with intractable migraines. Of the 61 patients in the study, 75% showed a decrease in the intensity of their headaches after receiving low dose IV Ketamine infusions over five days. The self-reported pain score from patients was on average 7.5/10 prior to the initiation of the study and 3.4/10 at the conclusion of the IV Ketamine infusions.
IV Ketamine has been used more recently to help treat neuropathic pain syndromes such as CRPS (Complex Regional Pain Syndrome), fibromyalgia, trigeminal neuralgia and herpetic neuralgias. It seems that there is a growing body of evidence to support that it may have a role in the treatment of intractable migraines as well.
If you suffer from intractable migraines or have been diagnosed with Social Anxiety disorder, IV Ketamine may be a treatment to consider. Please give us a call at Gulf Coast Ketamine Center. We thoroughly evaluate our patients to see if IV ketamine treatment is the best therapy for your specific needs.
To find out more about IV Ketamine Infusions, please contact their office today at 941-213-4444, or visit their website at findpainrelief.com
Steven Reichbach, MD
Board-Certified Anesthesiologist
President and Founder,
Gulf Coast Ketamine Center
Lolita Borges, RN
Clinical Director, Gulf Coast
Ketamine Center
Gulf Coast Ketamine Center
2415 University Parkway, Building #3,
Suite 215, Sarasota, FL 34243
941-213-4444 | www.findpainrelief.com
