BACKGROUND Ketamine is used as an anaesthetic agent for short surgical procedures, and as a sedative and analgesic in intensive care patients. Intensive care patients with brain or spinal cord injury may have physiological changes that could alter the pharmacokinetics of ketamine. The pharmacokinetics of ketamine have been studied in healthy volunteers and in patients undergoing different types...

The quality of induction of general anesthesia produced by ketamine and propofol, 2 of the most commonly used anaesthetic agents in cats, was assessed. Eighteen cats admitted for elective procedures were randomly assigned to 3 groups and then premedicated with xylazine 0.75 mg/kg intramuscularly before anaesthesia was induced with ketamine 15 mg/kg intramuscularly (KetIM group), ketamine 10 mg/...

AIM To examine the effectiveness and safety of the sedative agents used in the emergency department following the introduction of ketamine as an agent for procedural sedation METHODS A 2-year prospective audit of sedation practice was undertaken. This specifically examined the rationale behind a doctor's choice of sedative agent, the depth of sedation achieved, adverse events and the time tak...

Numerous studies have suggested that ketamine administration can induce neuroapoptosis in primary cultured cortical neurons. Neurosteroids modulate neuronal function and serve important roles in the central nervous system, however the role of neurosteroids in neuroapoptosis induced by ketamine remains to be elucidated. The present study aimed to explore whether neurosteroidogenesis was a pivota...

OBJECTIVE To study the effects of S-ketamine on the EEG and to investigate whether spectral entropy of the EEG can be used to assess the depth of hypnosis during S-ketamine anesthesia. METHODS The effects of sub-anesthetic (159 (21); mean (SD) ng/ml) and anesthetic (1,959 (442) ng/ml) serum concentrations of S-ketamine on state entropy (SE), response entropy (RE) and classical EEG spectral po...

ketamine is a promising alternative agent for pain control that offers benefit to traditional strategies, particularly in the setting of rib fracture. current pharmacologic therapies have clear adverse effects, and other options may be invasive, cost prohibitive, or marginally effective. we describe three consecutive patients with traumatic injuries including rib fracture for which a ketamine i...

Ketamine is an anesthetic agent which in recent years has gained prominence due to its antidepressant properties. However, the adverse effects resulting from the acute administration of this drug have been reported and are a challenge for use of ketamine as an antidepressant. The aim of this study was the characterization of the acute effects of ketamine in states of aggressiveness in adult zeb...

Fifty children undergoing inguinal herniotomy were allocated randomly to three groups to receive a caudal injection of either 0.25% bupivacaine 1 ml kg-1 with or without ketamine 0.5 mg kg-1 or ketamine 0.5 mg kg-1 with normal saline 1 ml kg-1. There was no significant difference in quality of pain relief, postoperative behaviour or analgesic requirements between the ketamine group and the two ...

Following administration at subanesthetic doses, (R,S)-ketamine (ketamine) induces rapid and robust relief from symptoms of depression in treatment-refractory depressed patients. Previous studies suggest that ketamine's antidepressant properties involve enhancement of dopamine (DA) neurotransmission. Ketamine is rapidly metabolized to (2S,6S)- and (2R,6R)-hydroxynorketamine (HNK), which have an...

The study compared the effectiveness of ketamine and midazolam/fentanyl as procedural sedation and analgesia agents for reduction of fractures and dislocated joints. Forty-one adult patients were enrolled by convenience sampling. They were randomized to receive ketamine or midazolam/fentanyl. Depth of sedation, pain score, procedural outcome and memory of the procedure were documented. The keta...