The Development of Ketamine for Depression: A Long and Winding Road From Inception to Implementation

Serendipity and astute clinical observation drove the development of antidepressants for the past 60 years. This talk  will chart the path of a very different antidepressant—ketamine—from its synthesis in 1962, to its widespread use as an anesthetic, to the animal and human studies that established its antidepressant properties, to its eventual FDA approval and use worldwide as the first antidepressant with a novel mechanism of action brought to market in decades. Unlike conventional antidepressants that are associated with a significant lag of onset of antidepressant effects, ketamine acts within hours.
Source: Biological Psychiatry - Category: Psychiatry Authors: Tags: Plenary and Symposium Abstracts 3 Source Type: research