- Major depression is a severe mental illness that may cause emotional and physical symptoms and diminished quality of life.
- Researchers are still seeking to understand the best methods for treating depression that is resistant to medication interventions.
- A new study found that ketamine infusion is comparable to electroconvulsive therapy in treating major depressive disorder.
Depression is a common mental illness. People often respond to treatments that combine medication and therapy, but some depression is resistant to typical techniques.
Experts still seek to understand how to help people with treatment-resistant major depression.
A recent study published in The New England Journal of Medicine compared the use of ketamine infusions with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) — two interventions for treatment-resistant major depression.
The researchers found that using ketamine may be as effective as electroconvulsive therapy in helping people with treatment-resistant depression, with little to no side effects.
Study author Dr. Amit Anand, director of psychiatry translational clinical trials at Mass General Brigham, told Medical News Today:
“The goal of the study was to investigate whether subanesthetic intravenous ketamine was nearly as good as ECT for treatment-resistant depression. The results were a bit surprising as ketamine did even better than that. Ketamine is good alternative for patients who have been recommended for ECT for treatment of their resistant depression.”
This study was an open-label, randomized, non-inferiority trial. Researchers recruited participants who had treatment-resistant major depression. All participants had been referred for electroconvulsive therapy.
Researchers divided participants into two groups. One group had 195 participants and received ketamine intravenous infusions twice weekly for three weeks. The other group had 170 participants and received electroconvulsive therapy three times weekly for three weeks.
They…
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