551. Esketamine in neuropsychiatric long COVID: a retrospective analysis
N Hartman, D Ivkic, M C Dorczok, Ina Bozic, L Reinfried, A-C Moser, G Fugger, B Ludwig, F Buchmayer, Marie Spies, Ana Weidenauer, Lucie Bartova, Coviket Study Group
The International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology September 1, 2026 DOI: 10.1093/ijnp/pyag040.161 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Review Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Esketamine |
| Key findings | Argues that Long COVID's neuropsychiatric manifestations overlap clinically and neurobiologically with depressive and anxiety disorders, and that converging evidence implicates neuroinflammation. The abstract is truncated and reports no primary findings. |
Abstract
Neuropsychiatric manifestations of Long COVID (LC) frequently include post-exertional malaise (Cheng et al. , 2025), fatigue, cognitive dysfunction and impairment, sleep disturbances, post-traumatic stress, autonomic dysregulation, pain, inner tension, psychomotor retardation, aberrations in appetite and weight (Badenoch et al. , 2022; O'Mahoney et al. , 2025), showing substantial clinical and neurobiological overlap with depressive and anxiety diseases, as demonstrated, for example, in neuroimaging studies (Braga et al. , 2023; Churchill et al. , 2023; Douaud et al. , 2022; Runia et al. , 2022; Siqueira et al. , 2025). Converging evidence implicates neuroinflammation (Lai et al.
Comparable studies
Other narrative reviews on esketamine, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Synthesizing the Evidence for Ketamine and Esketamine in Treatment-Resistant Depression: An International Expert Opinion on the Available Evidence and Implementation Adults with treatment-resistant depression | 2021 | Review | |
| Long-term safety of ketamine and esketamine in treatment of depression | 2022 | Review | |
| Ketamine, Esketamine, and Arketamine: Their Mechanisms of Action and Applications in the Treatment of Depression and Alleviation of Depressive Symptoms. | 2024 | Review | |
| The potential of ketamine for posttraumatic stress disorder: a review of clinical evidence. | 2023 | Review | |
| Variations in BDNF and Their Role in the Neurotrophic Antidepressant Mechanisms of Ketamine and Esketamine: A Review. Patients with depression | 2024 | Narrative review |