Ketamine clinic: ‘Life-saving’ treatment for severely depressed

A Palm Cove man says he had constant suicidal thoughts until he was prescribed a drug more commonly known for its recreational use.

Ketamine can be prescribed for treatment resistant depression and is sometimes even given intravenously to the acutely suicidal.

A Palm Cove man said he had constant suicidal thoughts until he was prescribed a drug more commonly known for its recreational use.

“I was driving a taxi at the time. I wasn’t well. I was having suicidal feelings. I didn’t know what to do, so I started seeing a psychologist,” *Alex said.

“The psychologist said: ‘You have to get stable on medication before I can treat you’.

“But I’d tried antidepressants before, and they had never worked. So I was really in a hard place.

“I was thinking about suicide all the time, and no treatment was working.

“Within three months of starting ketamine I was in remission”.

Alex described the treatment as potentially “life-saving”.

Ketamine is a dissociative drug that acts on different chemicals in the brain.

At high doses it can produce hallucinations and a detachment from reality. At low doses, there is a growing consensus it can be useful for many patients with treatment-resistant depression.

“I just didn’t have these intrusive thoughts about wanting to die anymore,” Alex said.

One clinic in Cairns has started prescribing it.

Buckets of ketamine seized by the AFP. Although used illicitly, Ketamine is also prescribed at low, regular doses for depression.

Dr Claire King, a general adult psychiatrist and director of QueenlsandTMS clinic in North Cairns, said ketamine, a drug initially used as an anaesthetic and later taken up by pain doctors, had proved an “incredible treatment” for those with treatment-resistant depression.

“Anti-depressants take, on average, at least two weeks to start working, whereas ketamine exerts its anti-depressant effect after only 48 to 72 hours,” Dr King said.

When prescribed in a medical setting, she said the drug does not intoxicate nor cause hallucinations or the dissociative feeling of disembodiment while a person is stuck in a “k-hole”, which some recreational users seek out.

Dr Jens Gaarslev. Picture: Justin Brierty

“I saw one patient who was very unwell for many years transformed, their function improved from being housebound to being able to work and enjoy their life once more,” Dr King said.

Alex, however, said that the drug’s positive effects waned slightly over time because the psychotherapy he undertook with a psychoanalyst at a separate clinic was cut short.

Dr King said the exact science of how or why it works in this way is as yet not fully understood.

Dr Jens Gaarslev, co-director at QueenslandTMS said that a dose of ketamine “brings the stressed brain back to press-stress levels” and makes it more “flexible in terms of change”.

Both psychiatrists stressed that the apparent success of ketamine in a clinical setting does not mean that people should take it recreationally.

They highlighted that there is extensive pre-screening and ongoing monitoring during treatment to ensure eligibility and safety.

For the right person, Dr King said: “I have seen first hand how it transforms lives.”

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* Name has been changed to protect confidentiality.

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Originally published as Ketamine clinic: ‘Life-saving’ treatment for severely depressed