A prescription version of ketamine called esketamine (Spravato), given through a nasal spray, was approved in 2019 by the FDA for hard-to-treat depression. However, guidelines required its use “under the supervision of a health care provider in a certified doctor’s office or clinic.” That means medical professionals need to watch you use it, and then follow you after you’ve taken your dose, checking your vital signs and how you are doing clinically. (Link)
Hey Elon, you got a doctor in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?
And it doesn’t fucking work. Like, straight up, Spravato doesn’t do anything to improve symptoms of treatment-resistant depression.
While a ketamine infusion given in a controlled environment and combined with talk therapy (like DBT) can help manage treatment resistant depression, this isn’t that.
Even the clinical trials for the drug didn’t indicate a statistically significant reduction in MADRS scores versus placebo, and seemingly the only thing it did was unblind the study. The fact that this drug got approved is genuinely shocking to me.
Hey Elon, you got a doctor in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?
And it doesn’t fucking work. Like, straight up, Spravato doesn’t do anything to improve symptoms of treatment-resistant depression.
While a ketamine infusion given in a controlled environment and combined with talk therapy (like DBT) can help manage treatment resistant depression, this isn’t that.
Even the clinical trials for the drug didn’t indicate a statistically significant reduction in MADRS scores versus placebo, and seemingly the only thing it did was unblind the study. The fact that this drug got approved is genuinely shocking to me.