Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP): Patient Demographics, Clinical Data and Outcomes in Three Large Practices Administering Ketamine with Psychotherapy

Summary & key facts

Researchers collected basic patient and outcome data from 235 people treated with ketamine together with psychotherapy at three private clinics. They looked at non-intravenous ways to give ketamine and used the drug's mind-changing effects as part of therapy rather than treating those effects as side effects. The data suggest this combined approach, called Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy or KAP, was linked with reductions in depression and anxiety, especially for older patients and people who started with worse symptoms. The study comes from real-world clinic settings, so the results are promising but not the same as findings from a tightly controlled clinical trial.

Key facts:

• The paper reports on 235 patients who received ketamine together with psychotherapy at three separate private practices.
• The authors describe using non-intravenous methods so that ketamine's psychedelic, or mind-changing, effects could be part of therapy rather than just side effects.
• Across these clinic settings, the data suggest KAP was associated with decreases in depression and anxiety symptoms.
• The benefit appeared strongest for older patients and for people who began treatment with more severe symptoms.
• The authors present this as the first analytical look at KAP across multiple practices, using real-world clinic data rather than a tightly controlled experiment.
• Because the data come from private practices and not from a randomized controlled trial, the findings are suggestive but not definitive proof that KAP causes improvement.

Abstract

Currently, ketamine is the only legal psychedelic medicine available to mental health providers for the treatment of emotional suffering. Over the past several years, ketamine has come into psychiatric use as an intervention for treatment resistant depression (TRD), administered intravenously without a psychotherapeutic component. In these settings, ketamine's psychedelic effects are viewed as undesirable "side effects." In contrast, we believe ketamine can benefit patients with a wide variety of diagnoses when administered with psychotherapy and using its psychedelic properties without need for intravenous (IV) access. Its proven safety over decades of use makes it ideal for office and supervised at-home use. The unique experience that ketamine facilitates with its biological, experiential, and psychological impacts has been tailored to optimize office-based treatment evolving into a method that we call Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP). This article is the first to explore KAP within an analytical framework examining three distinct practices that use similar methods. Here, we present demographic and outcome data from 235 patients. Our findings suggest that KAP is an effective method for decreasing depression and anxiety in a private practice setting, especially for older patients and those with severe symptom burden.

Topics

Psychedelics and Drug Studies Treatment of Major Depression Tryptophan and brain disorders

Categories

Clinical Psychology Psychology Social Sciences

Tags

Antidepressant Anxiety Clinical psychology Demographics Demography Depression (economics) Economics Intervention (counseling) Ketamine Macroeconomics Medicine Mental health Psychiatry Psychology Psychotherapist Sociology Treatment-resistant depression

Substances

Ketamine

Conditions & symptoms

Anxiety Anxiety or worry Sadness or low mood