Doctors at a Long Island hospital are using ketamine treatments to combat clinical depression — a drug that one patient says works better and faster than decades on Prozac.
Patients with severe depression at Mather Hospital take an esketamine nasal spray called Spravato, which Ellen Talmage, 66, says has changed her life in a way that other medications could not.
Some 62 percent of Mather’s nearly 40 patients in the program say they have seen an improvement in their symptoms.
“I’m doing so much better that after this (interview), I’m going to pick up my daughter-in-law and my two grandchildren, and we’re going to the ocean,” Talmage said.
It’s a far cry from how the once-reclusive woman from Baiting Hollow needed anti-anxiety medication just to go to the grocery store, where she often broke down crying.
“I once booked tickets to a very expensive concert for my birthday, and I couldn’t go – it was just part of the deal… anyone who does it for so long, you miss out on a lot of Christmas,” she said.
Doctors at Northwell Hospital believe this treatment could be a game-changer for the future.
“From not being able to get out of bed and get dressed, to thinking about the future, to having a job and having purpose and meaning in life,” Dr. Erin Dainer, chair of psychiatry at Mather Hospital in Port Jefferson, told the Post.
“I don’t see that with other treatments like I see with this one.”
The multi-week program begins with a low dose of 56 milligrams, administered in person twice a week, and is gradually increased as patients respond.
Users are held for two hours after each session in comfortable chairs with television and music, monitored for safety reasons because the drug can cause strong reactions.
Talmage compared it to riding Space Mountain.
“That’s the best way I can describe it — because it’s definitely colors and everything,” she said.
While conventional antidepressants target the hormones serotonin and norepinephrine, the spray instead focuses on “a completely different pathway”: hitting NMDA (N-methyl-D-aspartate) receptors at the cellular level to alter mood.
Mather hospital psychiatrist Paniz Johari believes that FDA-approved esketamine will play a seismic role in the management of treatment-resistant depression over the next decade.
“I think it’s hard to say, but at the rate we’re going, that’s what I think,” she said.
Mather’s team is also well aware of the stigma surrounding very different street-sold ketamines or “Special K,” like the one that “Friends” star Matthew Perry fatally overdosed on.
“Matthew Perry absolutely should never have happened,” Dainer said.
“That’s why we have so many regulations regarding this drug, because we want to ensure its safety and effectiveness.”
Another patient, who wished to remain anonymous, credited the treatments with giving him the courage to become a peer counselor to help others who are suffering.
“I think that’s really important between ketamine and helping other people, that it gives you purpose,” he said.
Gn Health
