in the US, we used ketamine to “induce” anesthesia (put someone to sleep quickly so that the gas anesthesia could take over). The advantage was it didn’t stop breathing (especially good if you had an emergency Caesarian section and didn’t have time to do a spinal), was hard to overdose and didn’t cause the blood pressure to tank (go down) if the person was in shock.
We used it a lot in Africa, where our “anesthetist’ was the guy who scrubbed the floor: we gave it until the patient stopped moving, and then told the guy who was running the drip for us to slow it down...when the patient started moving again, we had him increase the drip.
The bad news: It caused some folks nightmares when used alone.
So usually we gave some scopalamine or valium at the end of surgery to cause amnesia.
The nightmare problem was not in everyone, but it could be severe...that is why it is not used much except in emergencies like I noted...but it is known as a “horse tranquillizer” and kids use it to get high.
It doesn’t make you “sleep” as much as puts you in a state of dissociation, where you feel separated from your body, sort of catatonic...
So I can see why it might treat depression in the same way as other hallucinogens: on the other hand, any severe stress can relieve a depression...
However, the nightmare part will probably make folks unwilling to use it...
When a new kind of therapy is introduced, especially a new psychoactive drug, events often follow a pattern of spectacular success and enormous enthusiasm followed by disillusionment.
I don’t think that research should stop, especially b/c so many people suffer from PTSD, migraines and such. While a *cure* may not be possible...synthetic derivatives might prove to be useful .......I don’t think researchers should stop trying.
that is one of the more informative yet frightening posts in the history of free republic
They said he had ptsd and was being treated for it.
link to him saying he can't remember anything about that
night.......hmmm