Lena Dunham isn’t alone in going overboard on benzos.

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Many fans felt her pain on Monday when the 32-year-old “Girls” creator revealed on a podcast that she’s newly clean after a harrowing period of misusing the prescription sedatives, which are commonly prescribed to treat panic disorders and insomnia.

Pierre Blier discusses his research into using a well-known anaesthetic to help people with severe depression.

Celebrities seem to have it all. Yet, there’s often a dark hole in that charmed life that nothing is able to fill.

Ketamine may represent an effective adjunct therapy in the treatment of suicidal ideation in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD), according to the results of a randomized clinical trial published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

A doctor said she was astonished by how well ketamine helps patients suffering from depression.

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New research brings ketamine further away from its notoriety as “Special K” the club drug. 

Existing treatments for PTSD are only moderately effective. Researchers hope ketamine will offer longer-term relief.

When you hear about ketamine, you may associate it with being an illegal party drug that causes vivid hallucinations. But it's also a powerful anaesthetic, listed on the World Health Organisation's list of essential medicines.

Antidepressants are among the most commonly prescribed drugs throughout the western world. In fact, they are prescribed more than any other drug for Americans aged 18 to 44, and they are now taken four to five times more frequently than in the early 90s.

"If you have patients that are likely to seriously injure themselves or kill themselves within a short period of time, and they've tried the standard treatments, how do you not offer this treatment?"

The Washington Post

After a lifetime of profound depression, 25 years of therapy and cycling through 18 antidepressants and mood stabilizers, Hartman, then 46, had settled on a date and a plan to end it all. The clinical trial would be his last attempt at salvation.

Ketamine could be speedy depression treatment video: here

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is highly prevalent in the United States military forces, with rates as high as 31% and 20% for Vietnam War and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) veterans, respectively. An estimated 50% of patients diagnosed with PTSD also present with chronic pain.

Nautilus

Ketamine's remarkable effect bolsters a new theory of mental illness. Depression is the most common mental illness in the United States, affecting 30 percent of Americans at some point in their lives. 

Although it may seem counterintuitive, a new study suggests that giving soldiers a dose of the Schedule III drug, ketamine, before going into combat could have certain benefits. The findings, published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology in January.

Ketamine could save lives and offer rapid relief to many individuals for whom current treatments don’t work. It’s estimated as many as a third of patients with major depression do not get well, even after trying multiple antidepressants. And amid concerns that the development of novel antidepressants has stalled, ketamine research opens a possible avenue of treatment.

“Depression is the second most expensive health problem that we face worldwide, but this fact is not very well known because there is a stigma attached to depression and people don’t like to talk about it,” says study leader Bernhard Lüscher, professor of biology and of biochemistry and molecular biology at Penn State.

Preliminary evidence from two case reports suggests that a history of psychosis should not exclude a patient with severe depression from receiving ketamine in a clinical setting, researchers say.

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"There are some real concerns about whether ketamine should be used in people with psychotic disorders, based mainly on early studies suggesting that some of the immediate effects of ketamine can actually mimic some of the symptoms of psychosis," Gerard Sanacora, MD, PhD, professor of psychiatry, Yale University.

Researchers from Columbia University Medical Center, or CUMC, have discovered that a single dose of ketamine, given one week before a stressful event, has the potential to prevent post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, symptoms.

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The study used mice that were given a small intravenous dose of ketamine, a drug used as a general anesthetic or rapid-acting antidepressant, and showed the potential to prevent PTSD symptoms.

A one-off dose of the drug could help alcohol addicts reduce their intake by ‘erasing’ drink-related memories, say psychologists testing treatment.

TED Talk

The path to better medicine is paved with accidental yet revolutionary discoveries. In this well-told tale of how science happens, neuroscientist Rebecca Brachman shares news of a serendipitous breakthrough treatment that may prevent mental disorders like depression and PTSD from ever developing. And listen for an unexpected — and controversial — twist.

The study authors turn their attention to Ketamine as a potential treatment for alcoholism, pointing to a clinical trial in which 66 percent of alcoholic patients remained abstinent a full year after receiving ketamine treatment, compared with 24 percent who received non-psychedelic therapy.

Researchers know how to boost mice's resilience to stress, but can the same techniques be used for humans? Brachman’s results consistently showed that there are ways to build resilience to stress, by both injecting immune cells from another animal and giving a dose of ketamine prior to stress.

Ketamine, the anesthetic-turned-club-drug-turned-depression-therapy, has had a complicated history. And growing more so all the time: a pain physician told colleagues here that the ketamine infusions may be just the ticket for patients whose migraines and other headaches just won't quit.

Cleveland Clinic recognizing ketamine therapy to be one of the most transformational breakthroughs.

In the past five or 10 years ketamine — a drug that used to be primarily associated with psychedelically enhanced partying, K-holes, and jokes about horse tranquilizers — has captured the attention of the psychiatry community.

Is there a link between pain and depression? Pain and depression are closely related. Depression can cause pain — and pain can cause depression. 

Ketamine, used as an anaesthetic for many years, may offer hope to people suffering from recurrent depression. Researchers from Trinity College Dublin are investigating whether the drug can help people who recover from severe depression to remain well.

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There might be a drug out there that somehow instills the kind of mental resilience that lets some people go through a horrible experience without reliving it in a distressing way afterward. Not everyone who goes through trauma gets depressed, but those who do have a hard time shaking it. What if instead of treating that depression, it could be prevented?

Cleveland Clinic researchers have been approved for $11.8 million in funding to study ways to help patients suffering from severe depression.The focus of the research will be to examine strategies for treating patients who do not get adequate relief from initial therapy.

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Through the work of Dr. Amit Anand, vice chair for research in Cleveland Clinic's Center for Behavioral Health, the study will look into and compare the effectiveness of two treatments: electroconvulsive therapy versus ketamine in patients who suffer from severe treatment-resistant depression.

The largest clinical trial of ketamine for the ongoing treatment of depression has been launched across Australia and New Zealand this week.

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The three-year trial involves seven research institutions, testing 200 patients who have not previously responded to existing depression medication.

Approximately one-third of patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) do not respond to existing antidepressants, and those who do generally take weeks to months to achieve a significant effect. There is a clear unmet need for rapidly acting and more efficacious treatments. We will review recent developments in the study of ketamine, an old anaesthetic agent which has shown significant promise as a rapidly acting antidepressant in treatment-resistant patients with unipolar MDD, focusing on clinically important aspects such as dose, route of administration and duration of effect.

Scientists are increasingly convinced that ketamine, a popular “club drug,” may be a viable treatment option for people who suffer from depression. The drug could hold particular promise for people who are suicidal, according to the results of one small study.

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Depression is so common that people in the U.S. spend about $11 billion each year to relieve their symptoms. Most antidepressants work by adjusting the brain chemicals that can affect our mood, and while some are effective, the drugs are far from perfect.

Researchers have identified the ketamine breakdown product that gives the drug its antidepressant effects, which could lead to faster, more-effective mood stabilizers in the future.

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When the antidepressant effects of ketamine were first reported a decade ago, the anesthetic drug seemed likely to change the way doctors treat the most persistent cases of depression. Since 2006, the surgical drug has been shown to work in patients with treatment-resistant depression and provide relief much faster than mood stabilizers like SSRIs. 

A breakdown product of the drug reduces signs of depression in mice without side effects.

The popular club drug ketamine—or 'Special K'—is also a fast-acting antidepressant, but how it works has eluded scientists. Now a team reports in Nature that the mood-lifting effect may not be caused by the drug itself, but by one of the products formed when the body breaks the drug down into smaller molecules.

A 'club drug' used as an anesthetic can help clear up the distraught thinking of people on the brink of suicide, researchers reported Tuesday.

Half the patients given infusions of ketamine said they experienced relief from their thoughts of suicide, Dr. Dawn Ionescu of Massachusetts General Hospital and colleagues reported.

A chemical byproduct, or metabolite, created as the body breaks down ketamine likely holds the secret to its rapid antidepressant action, National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists and grantees have discovered.  This metabolite singularly reversed depression-like behaviors in mice without triggering any of the anesthetic, dissociative, or addictive side effects associated with ketamine.

Everyone’s depression is different, but Ted, a 40-year-old resident of Portland, Oregon, describes his as a “continuous dark veil — a foul, dark, awful perspective that informs every moment of your whole life.” He’d tried to treat it with antidepressants, therapy, visits to psychiatrists, “the whole nine,” but although the antidepressants kept him functional, they by no means offered relief. He was getting desperate, so when his sister — an obstetrician who works in New York — mentioned the National Institute of Health was conducting experimental studies using ketamine to treat depression, he gave them a call.

Ketamine is being used to combat severe depression and suicidal thoughts in patients who do not respond to traditional therapy.
 

EurekAlert

A study by researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center is offering a glimmer of hope to alcoholics who find it hard to remain sober because their abstinence is hounded by stubborn, difficult-to-treat depression.

Science Alert

"The most significant advance in mental health in more than half a century."

Motherboard

"I'm going to die soon". For months, that is what the voice inside my head told me.

Yale News

Chronic overeating and stress are tied to an increased risk of depression and anxiety, and in a new

study, Yale researchers explain why that happens and suggest a possible solution.

MedPage Today

Can glutamate drugs treat the worst cases of depression -- and keep pharma in psychiatry?

MedCareer News

Ketamine, known as Special K on the streets, has become a surprise weapon in the war against depression.

The small Israeli pharma company NeuroRx is testing a novel compound of two existing drugs to quash suicidal feelings.

This study examines whether Ketamine can cause a rapid-next day antidepressant effect in patients with Major Depression/Bipolar Disorder 

Encouraged by research showing that ketamine can relieve even the worst depression in a matter of hours, these doctors are giving the drug to some of their toughest patients.

f you suffer from depression symptoms that don’t abate, or don’t abate entirely, with conventional treatments, you’re not the only one. Treatment-resistant depression is very common. Thirty to 40 percent of the 13 to 14 million Americans who are diagnosed with depression each year won’t experience full recovery, or any recovery, with standard SSRI treatment.

Monitoring the effects of ketamine on the brain has revealed neural pathways that could aid the development of fast-acting medications for treating depression.

R-ketamine showed a greater potency and longer-lasting antidepressant effect...

Following the discovery of the antidepressant properties of ketamine, there has been a recent resurgence in the interest in this NMDA receptor antagonist.

Ketamine is known to be active in vital circuits of the brain and to disconnect two parts which are connected in depression.

Ketamine may be beneficial for children with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and episodes of severe aggression and emotional dysregulation, according to a case report published online Aug. 10 in Pediatrics.

Numerous genes that regulate the activity of a neurotransmitter in the brain have been found to be abundant in brain tissue of depressed females.

Allergan AGN -2.15%,the drug giant that is famed for Botox but also makes antibiotics and an Alzheimer’s treatment, will spend $560 million to purchase Naurex, an Evanston, Ill.-based developer of antidepressants that can work in hours, compared to weeks for existing depression pills.