Video Transcript
Party drug or powerful therapy tool. Sam Peterson of MindSpot Denver joins us now to break down the risks and benefits of ketamine in treating mental health issues. Welcome, Sam. Thanks for having me on the show. It’s a pleasure to be here. Yeah, well, I am so interested because I keep hearing about ketamine.
I don’t know anything really about it. So let’s just start with the basics. What is it? So ketamine is a disassociative anesthetic. Um, it is an NMDA receptor antagonist, and it works on the glutamate system in, in the brain. And it has really, uh, a litany of effects. In fact, the, the world health organization lists ketamine as one of its essential medications because of its uses in anesthesia, both in.
Pediatric medicine and bariatric medicine. It’s it’s literally used every single day across our nation to to help people that are going under for surgery. Right. So but now we’re hearing about it as a treatment potentially for mental health issues. So, you know, what are you seeing it being used for? Yeah, so what we use ketamine in the clinical space in the outpatient clinical space for is for the treatment of depression, the treatment of anxiety and the treatment of the symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder.
And, uh, we’re also seeing that it has some really great applications with the treatment of traumatic brain injuries, uh, at least in a, um, in a short window kind of sense. Hmm. So, you know, maybe you have some examples of, you know, people who may have come to you and undergone this treatment and like what kind of results you’ve seen.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, so I just actually got a, got a text message from, from one of our patients today, a former special forces operator out of a 10 special forces group. And this operator was dealing with, you know, after he got out of the military, you know, consistent brain fog issues with motivation, trouble getting up in the morning, it was just that, that.
kind of sequelae of depression symptoms that we see that, uh, operators and, you know, individuals in the military who have dealt with TBI are living with every day. And he had his first ketamine session and I’ll just read you what, what do you, you know, he sent to me. He said, Hey man, you were right. One day after my first session and I’m crushing in the gym, I’m waking up on time and I’m motivated to start each day.
I haven’t felt this good yet. Since I got out of the teams and that’s something that we, you know, we see quite often with ketamine. It has a very rapid, uh, onset of effects. So someone who’s struggling with depression symptoms or like traumatic brain injury symptoms, in this case, they get near instantaneous, uh, relief from, you know, the symptoms, which, you know, we’re postulating has a lot to do with ketamine’s anti inflammatory effects on the brain.
Hmm. So would you say it’s more effective or just as effective than what is currently being used to treat depression or PTSD or anxiety? Like, how do they compare? Well, if you’re looking at, you know, let’s just say, let’s talk about depression. And if you’re looking at selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, SSRIs, the, on the very best day, those antidepressant medications have a 33 percent chance of reducing depressive symptoms.
And we see that from the STAR D study, which is the largest study on antidepressant medications that’s ever been done. Ketamine, on the other hand, has between a 70 to 80 percent chance at relieving those same symptoms in a fraction of the time. Because when you, when you think about, SSRIs, the average time for that medication to become effective is anywhere from eight to ten weeks.
With ketamine, it can be as fast as one to two infusions, which is, you know, three days. Wow. So we’ve heard a lot about the benefits. What should people know about like risks or side effects or any potential dangers? Yeah. So, you know, the side effects of ketamine there, there is a dissociative aspect to this.
It is a dissociative anesthetic. That dissociative function can be very disorienting to people. It can also cause nausea and headaches in the short term. But if overall, kidney is a very, very safe medication. It is used literally in pediatric medicine for, you know, for surgery. So the, there are risks with it, especially with chronic use.
I would never, you know, tell someone that they should do this recreationally. This is a, this is a therapeutic modality that You know, in my opinion, the opinion of the doctors that I work with needs to be done in a clinical setting under the supervision of a psychiatrist or an anesthesiologist. So you mentioned, you know, people who do it recreationally, are they using the same thing as what’s being used in a clinical setting or is there a difference?
I mean, there’s always a difference between, you know, clinical grade, uh, pharmaceuticals and street drugs. The, you know, obviously with clinical grade pharmaceuticals, we don’t have to worry about things like adulterants. Um, Okay. And there’s also, you know, a difference in method of administration, like in our clinic, we use IV ketamine exclusively, uh, for a number of reasons.
And typically when ketamine is done in a recreational sense, it is encephalated or snorted, um, which I, I don’t think is the, is a great method of administration for, for a number of reasons. So if somebody is considering this, what should they know before making a decision? So, you know, the big thing to know about ketamine is that they’re This experience can be very disorienting, especially when we’re talking about differences in dose.
Um, when individuals are sitting down for an infusion, uh, if you want to get the most out of it, it helps to set an intention to, to go into this with something you want to process, because one of the things that ketamine does, and one of the reasons that It is postulated that it’s such a powerful antidepressant is it up regulates brain derived neurotropic factor.
That’s the hormone that causes your, your brain cells to branch out and create new synaptic connections, which is what we’re looking for in mental health. That’s, you know, that’s why, why anyone does what we do in mental health is to help create new connections in the brain. So people can think differently and really just observe their environment and interact with their environment in a different way.
Wow. This has been fascinating. Thank you so much, Sam. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me.