Transcript
Doctors are using a common date rape drug to stop suicides.
Ketamine is widely thought of as a club drug, a date rape drug, but at a couple hundred centers around the country, doctors have been using it to help patients at real risk of dying by suicide.
It’s been referred to as a “save shot.”
Ketamine seems to target areas of the brain that have withered away due to depression, and grow new synapses.
One patient said his infusion worked quickly and his depression symptoms went from severe to mild to nonexistent over a few months.
But none of this comes cheap.
It cost nearly $500 per infusion with most patients needing up to six infusions to start and boosters every few weeks after.
For now, insurance doesn’t cover any of it.