the psychedelic therapy clinic in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on August 28, 2020. A phase 2 clinical trial of 231 patients with treatment-resistant depression found that the oral use of an extended-release tablet of ketamine could help prevent another depressive episode and is more effective and safer than the intravenous application of the medication. Patients reported side effects like headaches, dizziness, and anxiety.
“We hypothesized that an extended-release tablet formulation of ketamine could be an effective and well-tolerated treatment option for patients with treatment-resistant depression,” wrote lead researcher Paul Glue, a professor of psychological medicine at the University of Otago, New Zealand, and colleagues, in their study that was published in
In the second phase, 168 participants were divided into two groups. One group received placebo pills and the other was administered 180 mg of ketamine tablets twice per week. “A common concern about most currently available ketamine and esketamine formulations is the risk of abuse. The extended-release ketamine tablets used in this study are exceptionally hard and difficult to shatter, due to annealing of polyethylene oxide during their manufacturing process,” the researchers explained.