Military veterans across the country are scrambling after more than a dozen clinics that had been providing them with free ketamine treatments for severe depression, chronic pain or post-traumatic stress disorder suddenly closed.
Patients and employees of the Ketamine Wellness Centers, or KWC, said they were blindsided when the company, one of the nation’s largest operators of ketamine clinics, announced on its website on March 10 that it had shuttered all 13 of its locations in nine states.
“I cried for days,” said Travis Zubick, a U.S. Navy veteran, who was a patient at the company’s Minnesota location. “They packed up and left town, and that’s over.”
Zubick and about 50 other former service members had been relying on KWC’s partnership with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for free ketamine treatments.
Now, many are rushing to find another facility that takes their VA insurance before the effects of their last treatment wear off.
“Without the treatment, you’re in your own psychological jail,” Zubick said. “And with it, you have freedom, so it means everything.”
Several studies have shown that ketamine, most commonly used as a surgical anesthetic, can rapidly and significantly reduce depression among people who have not seen improvements from other types of treatments.
Without the treatment, you’re in your own psychological jail.
For those cases, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2019 approved a nasal spray version of the drug, which is taken with an oral antidepressant. But in 2022, the agency said ketamine is not FDA-approved for the treatment of any psychiatric disorder and warned health care professionals of potential risks.
Zubick, 42, said years of counseling and medications did not help him feel better, but his first intravenous dose of ketamine drastically reduced his physical pain and mental anguish.
“It gave me hope for a different kind of future,” said Zubick, who said the KWC closures have exacerbated the depression and…
Read the full article here