The American Journal of Medicine
December 2018
Jabril Eldufani, Alireza Nekoui, Gilbert Blaise
Ketamine is considered a dissociative anesthetic medication, and it is commonly administered by a parenteral route. It works mainly by blocking the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor. It inhibits the voltage-gated Na and K channels and serotonin and dopamine reuptake; also, it affects specific receptors, such as α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid, kainate, and aminobutyric acid A...
Journal of Psychedelic Studies
December 1, 2018
L. Stewart
With all the recent excitement about the resurgence of clinical research on the classic serotonergic psychedelics, in what has been labeled the psychedelic renaissance, it is easy to overlook a concurrent revolution taking place in the field of ketamine research. More than 50 years have passed since the synthesis of ketamine, and it remains today the most widely available compound with...
Journal of Clinical Psychopharmacology
December 1, 2018
Thomas Knuijver, Maarten Belgers, Wiebren Markus et al.
expressed in brain regions associated with emotional processing. Modulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis by altering cortisol tone also seems to be involved in this effect. The ECS modulates stress and anxiety. Serum AEA and 2-AG levels are increased after stress, and AEA levels are negatively associated to baseline anxiety and are significantly reduced in womenwith major...
Nature and Science of Sleep
November 26, 2018
Ali A El-Solh
Nightmares are considered the hallmark of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Although the characteristics of these distressing dreams may vary with the type of traumatic event, the pathophysiology exposes central dysfunction of brain structures at the level of the hippocampus, amygdala, and locus coeruleus, modulated by neurochemical imbalance in nor-adrenergic, dopaminergic, and serotonin...
Edelweiss Psychiatry Open Access
November 19, 2018
J. Hesselink
1 citation
Pharmacoor psycho-active compounds in traditional medicines or in plants used during neoshamanic rituals can sometimes lead to the (re-) discovery of new drugs for chronic pain, anxiety, depression or schizophrenia. Neoshamanic rituals fulfill the needs for healing and transformation of a number of people, who are partly dissatisfied with the absence of certain healing aspects in western...
Journal of Neuroscience
November 19, 2018
Anthony S. Gabay, Matthew J. Kempton, James Gilleen et al.
40 citations
Social decision-making is fundamental for successful functioning and can be affected in psychiatric illness and by serotoninergic modulation. The Prisoner's Dilemma is the archetypal paradigm to model cooperation and trust. However, the effect of serotonergic enhancement is poorly characterized, and its influence on the effect of variations in opponent behavior unknown. To address this, we...
Neuropsychopharmacology
November 2018
Lakshmi Rajagopal, Mei Huang, Eric Michael et al.
GABAergic drugs are of interest for the treatment of anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, pain, cognitive impairment associated with schizophrenia (CIAS), and other neuropsychiatric disorders. Some evidence suggests that TPA-023, (7-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-6-(2-ethyl-2H-1,2,4-triazol-3-ylmethoxy)-3-(2-fluorophenyl)-1,2,4-triazolo[4,3-b] pyridazine), a GABAA α2,3 subtype-selective GABAA partial...
Neuropharmacology
November 2018
David J Heal, Jane Gosden, Sharon L. Smith
Psychedelics comprise drugs come from various pharmacological classes including 5-HT2A agonists, indirect 5-HT agonists, e.g., MDMA, NMDA antagonists and κ-opioid receptor agonists. There is resurgence in developing psychedelics to treat psychiatric disorders with high unmet clinical need. Many, but not all, psychedelics are schedule 1 controlled drugs (CDs), i.e., no approved medical use. For...
Neuropharmacology
November 2018
Rachael Ingram, Heather Kang, Stafford Lightman et al.
Ketamine, a channel blocking NMDA receptor antagonist, is used off-label for its psychedelic effects, which may arise from a combination of several inter-related actions. Firstly, reductions of the contribution of NMDA receptors to afferent information from external and internal sensory inputs may distort sensations and their processing in higher brain centres. Secondly, reductions of NMDA...
Neuropharmacology
November 2018
Edward M. Sellers, Myroslava K. Romach, Deborah B. Leiderman
Scientific curiosity and fascination have played a key role in human research with psychedelics along with the hope that perceptual alterations and heightened insight could benefit well-being and play a role in the treatment of various neuropsychiatric disorders. These motivations need to be tempered by a realistic assessment of the hurdles to be cleared for therapeutic use. Development of a...