Depression is a common yet serious mental health condition. It affects the way a person thinks and behaves. It also makes it difficult to carry out day-to-day activities. It is important to recognize the symptoms and get medical help at the earliest. The existing treatments work great for most in treating depression. Doctors generally prescribe anti-depressants.
What is treatment-resistant depression (TRD)?
Not all people recover with antidepressant medication. One third of the patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) are treatment resistant. A person is diagnosed with this condition if he/she taken minimum of 2 anti-depressants for a certain period and doesn’t experience any changes.
Solution for patients with TRD:
TRD leaves a person feeling discouraged and hopeless. For the patients, who don’t show any improvement using medication, doctors generally recommend them other therapies like talk therapy, electroconvulsive therapy, vagnus nerve stimulation, transcranial magnetic stimulation and more. Recently FDA has approved the use of Esketamine nasal spray for treating TRD.
This prescription-only nasal spray is used in conjunction with other oral antidepressants. The spray is fast-acting and made available to public through tight distribution and monitoring. If you are looking for clinics offering esketamine solution for TRD in Virginia, schedule an initial consultation with Mind Peace Clinic.
The clinic has a good track record of treating a number of TRD patients using esketamine. Their skilled medical practitioners monitor patients closely and help them in the path of recovery. Unlike other antidepressants that take at least weeks to start taking effect, esketamine solution’s effects can be seen in a matter of hours.
Introduction to Esketamine:
Ketamine was used as an anesthetic medicine back in 1960 Vietnam War. In low doses it relieves pain. It also causes changes in a person’s sense of sound and sight and hallucinations. There have been unfortunate cases of ketamine abuse. In the right hands, it serves as a great cure. Esketamine is a type of ketamine that has been in use since 1970.
S-ketamine and r-ketamine are two forms of ketamine. Both have different properties. Esketamine comprises of the S form. Despite treating depression, previous studies on ketamine for treating depression caused unexpected problems. Esketamine on the other hand has lower doses of ketamine and exhibited the same antidepressant effects but is safer.
Side effects of Esketamine:
As with any drugs, Eskatamine comes with side-effects. The side effects include:
- Dizziness
- Nausea
- Dissociation
- Mild to moderate sedation
- Vertigo
- Increased blood pressure
- Anxiety
- Numbness
- Feeling drunk
- Vomiting
Treating depression using Esketamine
Since there is more potential for esketamine abuse, the nasal spray cannot be administered by self. During the first phase of treatment, patients would have to go to their clinic twice a week for a month to get it administered. The patients are closely monitored throughout the phase and the effects are assessed at the end on 4 weeks.
If the patient experienced decreased depression symptoms, patients have to come to the clinic once a week for booster treatment. In case the patient doesn’t experience significant effects during the first phase, the doctor is likely to evaluate the need of further esketamine treatment.
TRD is a debilitating condition. This FDA-approved nasal spray could be the miracle drug for your depression.