Ketamine for Anxiety

What Are Anxiety Disorders?

In order to be considered a disorder condition, your anxiety has to be out of proportion to the actual danger of your situation, and it has to cause a significant problem with your daily function and quality of life. Only an informed professional such as the mental health doctors at the Dr. Ditzell Psychiatry can determine if you have an anxiety disorder.

There are several types of anxiety disorders, such as:

• Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) that’s persistent and causes you to feel on edge most all the time
• Panic disorder, in which you’re prone to panic attacks that are brief attacks of high intensity with physical symptoms
• Agoraphobia, where you intensely fear specific situations, such as being in a public place or being outside your home
• Social anxiety disorder where you have an overwhelming fear of social situations

Each of these disorders has its own features, but they’re all based on anxiety, which often leads to withdrawal and isolation, hopelessness and even suicidal ideation. Aside from being painful, anxiety disorders can cause you to:

• Be unable to work
• Leave your home
• Undermine your relationships
• Lose out on enjoying life
• Harm your body by releasing too many stress hormones

Anxiety and depression often go together too. Anxiety can cause depression because you become exhausted from being on edge all the time and feel hopeless about getting better. Anxiety disorders may even lead you to think about suicide because of the pain that they cause.

What Are the Benefits of Ketamine Therapy for Anxiety?

Ketamine therapy for anxiety offers a safe and effective treatment that may work quicker than traditional medications and provide greater relief for your symptoms. There are medications for anxiety that work for some people, but some medicine has a high addiction potential, which can even worsen anxiety when you stop.

This has not been observed in the use of ketamine treatment. Therapy can also be effective, but it’s limited if you’re still feeling disabled by anxiety. Ketamine therapy can also be effective at curbing the anxiety that occurs with other mental illnesses such as major depression, PTSD and OCD.

Some of the major benefits of ketamine for anxiety disorder include:

• Rapid relief, sometimes starting with the first treatment
• Effective relief of comorbid conditions like depression and OCD
• Decreased suicidal ideation
• Minimal side effects
• Treatments administered in a therapeutic and calming environment
• Ketamine may help to build healthy brain connections
• Increased motivation and desire for activity

Ketamine therapy can offer hope through rapid relief of symptoms. Although no medication is going to offer the complete solution, ketamine treatment may be able to get you to the point where you can effectively use therapy and behavioral interventions to manage and decrease your anxiety in day-to-day life.

What Is the Efficacy and Safety of Ketamine in the Management of Anxiety?

• Low Doses: Ketamine therapy for anxiety uses much lower doses than those used for anesthesia.
• Minimal Side Effects: Side effects are generally mild and can sometimes be pleasant. Some commonly reported side effects include headaches, nausea, dizziness, and tachycardia. These side effects usually normalize within an hour after infusion.
• Dissociation: Ketamine can induce a feeling of dissociation. This effect is generally temporary, peaking around 30 minutes after infusion and returning to normal within 60 minutes.
• Addiction Potential: Unlike some traditional anxiety medications, ketamine has not been observed to have a high addiction potential. The delivery method is important in assessing abuse potential, with oral and injection methods reducing the potential for abuse.
• Monitoring: Ketamine therapy is typically administered under medical supervision to monitor and manage any side effects that may occur.