Spotlight: Intermittent ketamine and neuromodulation treatment evoke synergistic antidepressant-relevant action (Brown, et al, 2025)
"The rapid response that can be observed following ketamine treatment has reconceptualized how pharmacotherapy can treat depression. One subanesthetic infusion can alleviate symptoms within hours; however, sustained relief also requires multiple doses. "
Spotlight: Efficacy and safety of ketamine maintenance therapy in treatment-resistant depression: A systematic review of treatment protocols and clinical outcomes (Al-Garni, et al, 2025)
"Concurrent psychotherapy improved treatment maintenance. Adverse events were generally mild to moderate... Ketamine maintenance therapy shows promise as a treatment option for TRD, with regular dosing schedules and early intervention associated with optimal outcomes."
Spotlight: Oral ketamine for the treatment of major depressive and bipolar disorder, a randomized controlled trial and meta-analysis (Silberbauer, et al, 2025)
Treatment was well-tolerated, with no serious adverse events reported...in a total of 592 patients, meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials on oral ketamine treatment demonstrated its antidepressant efficacy with a Number Needed to Treat = 4.89 for response and a NNT = 9.16 for remission.
Spotlight: Antidepressants and the endogenous opioid system (Fricker, et al, 2025)
"A growing body of evidence links the opioid system w/ major depressive disorder... two different widely used antidepressants, tianeptine & ketamine, both interact with MOR; tianeptine as a full agonist, ketamine as a positive allosteric modulator. Both produce antidepressant effects within days."
Spotlight: Real-world clinical data on the long-term effectiveness and safety of generic racemic ketamine treatment (Massaneda-Tuneu, et al, 2025)
"Findings suggested that racemic ketamine (including by mouth), when appropriately dosed and administered within a structured clinical and safety monitoring framework, is both effective, safe and well-tolerated over a 6-month treatment period."
Spotlight: Synaptic priming: A framework for pharmacotherapy in depression (Brown, et al, 2025)
"we describe how the indirect relationship between ketamine's pharmacokinetics and sustained antidepressant pharmacodynamics reveals a dosing model (primer pharmacology) that can be harnessed to fine-tune therapeutic outcomes."