Patients undergoing ketamine-or psychedelic-assisted therapy for cancer-related distress, treatment-resistant depression, or end-of-life existential fear frequently report experiences resembling death or near-death: a sense of leaving the body, encountering something transcendent, or having died and returned. This synthesis reviews peer-reviewed evidence on how often this occurs, why it may...
Background: Ketamine, an arylcyclohexylamine dissociative anesthetic agent, has evolved into a versatile therapeutic. It has a rapid onset, well-understood cardiovascular effects, and a favorable safety profile in clinical use. Its enantiomeric compound, esketamine, was approved by the FDA in 2019 for both treatment-resistant depression as well as major depressive disorder (MDD) with suicidal...