Are Ketamine IV Infusions Safe?

If you’ve heard about ketamine and wondered if it could help with your depression, it’s well worth talking to a medical professional. Some patients with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder have reported that integrating ketamine into their care plan has been life-changing.

If you’ve battled depressive symptoms for years, you might be willing to try just about anything to get relief — even something with a high level of risk. Fortunately, with ketamine, you don’t have to foray into that uncertain territory.

Ketamine intravenous (IV) infusions give you a safe, effective treatment to try, and we offer this therapy at our SmartClinic Urgent Care offices in West Covina and Santa Clarita, California. If you’ve been living with depression and other treatments haven’t helped, don’t hesitate to talk to our expert providers.

To further put your mind at ease about the safety of ketamine, let’s look at its historical usage and the promise it shows for depression today. 

The history of ketamine use for depression

Ketamine got its start as an animal anesthetic in the 1960s. Just a decade later, the US Food and Drug Administration approved it to treat soldiers who sustained injuries during the Vietnam War. 

Medical professionals still use it today for its sedative effects. From operating rooms to emergency wards, doctors regularly turn to ketamine to safely ease discomfort and agitation. 

In fact, emergency responders were some of the earliest practitioners to realize that ketamine could help with depression. They used it to calm people being transported by ambulance after mental illness led to attempted self-harm. Then, those people treated with ketamine started reporting that they hadn’t had depressive symptoms in months. 

As anecdotal evidence grew, researchers started evaluating its validity as a prescribable treatment for depression. The medical research backed up patients’ first-hand accounts of feeling better.

Today, medical professionals offer ketamine infusions to help people who struggle with depression and other mood disorders that haven’t responded to traditional treatments.

Building in safety with ketamine treatment

You may be familiar with ketamine as a party drug, and when it’s used casually, especially with alcohol and in unregulated amounts, it can absolutely be dangerous — even lethal. But when administered in carefully controlled doses under medical supervision, you can eliminate the vast majority of risks. 

When you choose ketamine IV infusions at SmartClinic Urgent Care, you can rest easy knowing our team is trained and will monitor you the entire time you’re undergoing treatment in a comfortable, safe environment.

If you want to learn more about the safety of ketamine and what it could do for your treatment-resistant depression or other mood disorder, call SmartClinic Urgent Care at 661-430-9040. You can also book a consultation online.