Should You Add Ketamine Infusions To Your Medical Practice?

We get this question a lot, “Knowing everything you know, should I start providing ketamine infusions to my medical clinic?” Well it all depends. In this blog post we’ll go over the pros and cons of adding ketamine infusions to your practice.

There has been a rise in the number of mental health disorders and depression. This means that the demand for effective treatments, such as ketamine infusions, is rising.

Pro - Ketamine infusions are an effective treatment and the demand is increasing

In 2020, everyone across the world experienced isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of this, the number of mental health disorders and depression drastically increased. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in June 2020, “The prevalence of symptoms of anxiety disorder was approximately three times those reported in the second quarter of 2019 (25.5% versus 8.1%), and prevalence of depressive disorder was approximately four times that reported in the second quarter of 2019 (24.3% versus 6.5%).” 

There is clearly an increasing demand for an innovative and effective treatment for mood and pain disorders. Unfortunately, there are not enough ketamine infusion clinics to meet this demand. According to the ASKP3 website, there are more than 400 ketamine infusion clinics in the US. But that’s not enough. Adding ketamine infusions to your practice can help fill in the gap.

Like all innovative or new therapies, ketamine infusions must be accepted by the overall medical community, but not everyone is on board.

Con - Not everyone is onboard with the “Psychedelic renaissance”

Ketamine was first introduced in the early 1956 with the synthesis of the drug, phencyclidine. It was found to be a remarkable anesthetic for monkeys, but not for humans after more clinical studies. Ketamine was eventually derived from phencyclidine by Dr. Calvin Lee Stevens of Wayne State University. Since then, it has been used as a dissociative anesthetic.

 We are currently in a psychedelic renaissance. It is significantly changing the way the healthcare world is approaching the treatment of chronic pain mental health related issues. Issues like depression, PTSD, and addiction. Ketamine is currently the only legal psychedelic available (although MDMA and psilocybin are well on their way to become legal therapies). But like all innovative or new therapies, they must be accepted by the overall medical community, and not everyone is on board.

Once you find a clinic and the right staff to assist you in your ketamine clinic, you’re already done with half the battle.

Pro - Finding the space and staffing for your ketamine infusion clinic is already half the battle

Half the battle in starting up a ketamine infusion clinic is having a place to provide it. This means finding a clinic and the staff to assist you. You have to know where to order the medications and get the medical supplies. The list goes on and on, and this is where people can get stuck. But when you already have a clinic, you are already halfway there. It is now just a matter of making sure you know what you exactly need to do the ketamine infusions, how to do it, and what to watch out for. 

Don’t have a clinic of your own or are thinking of starting one? Do you want to learn how to provide ketamine infusions to treat mood and pain disorders? We can help you achieve this with our Ketamine StartUp 101 course. Follow the link to find out when our next course enrollment is!

Chances are your medical training didn’t cover using ketamine, and this can pose as a challenge when starting your own ketamine clinic.

Con - Your past medical training did not include education on ketamine infusion therapy

Chances are your medical training didn’t cover using ketamine in any form, or it was a very long time ago. Whatever the reason may be, this is a legitimate and understandable “con.” But it isn’t insurmountable. Sure, if you did have training with ketamine, it could be considered outside of your scope of practice. But once you get trained on how to use it, your scope expands. YOU can be properly trained on the use of ketamine to treat mood and pain disorders.

But let's take a quick moment, to remind you of something very important. As physicians we have taken an oath to first do no harm. We will be the first to tell you to not add ketamine to your practice if you are not committed to providing safe and ethical treatments. You have to commit yourself to learning everything you need to know to properly provide ketamine treatments. You also need to feel comfortable about handling any emergency that could come up! If you are willing to do the work and put your patient’s overall well being first, then we welcome you to become a ketamine provider! 

If this “con” applies to you, we got you covered! Check out when our next open enrollment for Therapeutic Ketamine Delivery is. We will teach you everything you need to know to safely and effectively treat patients with ketamine infusions.

Adding value, such as providing ketamine infusions, is important if you want to start a successful business and make money.

Pro - Providing this therapy is a way to diversify what services you can provide and add value

A way to always have business, make money, or be of service is to ALWAYS add value in the lives of those around you. This is the way we practice and live our life. Providing ketamine infusions is one way to add value and offer more services to your patients and local community. 

And this isn’t only adding value to your patients but also your colleagues! One of the most frustrating things we faced when we both were practicing traditional medicine (Sam as an ER doc and Kim as an ophthalmologist) was when we got to the end of the line of options of medical intervention. In other words, when we could no longer help. There are colleagues in your medical community who are feeling that way about treating pain and mood disorders in their patients. You providing ketamine is a way you can help give your colleagues a new option! Remember to be of service and add value!

Providing ketamine infusions means that you may need to restructure your clinic and retrain your staff.

Con - You would have to retrain your staff or restructure your clinic

If you already have a clinic, that's great. But you may need to change the way you run it and how your staff works with you when taking care of your ketamine infusion patients. This applies if your clinic is not set up for continuous vital sign monitoring (or at least frequent monitoring). Additionally, if your clinic is noisy, or your staff is not trained in dealing with potential airway management issues. You will need to provide training for them or hire additional staff in these situations. Ketamine can create non-ordinary states of consciousness and can create feelings of dissociation and realization. Thus you would need to train your staff to be supportive for your patients in such situations. Plus when your patients are experiencing this, you don’t want them to be in a room with several other patients or where it is noisy. This can be a major issue if your staff is unwilling to retrain or your clinic does not have the physical capacity to provide this level of monitoring and supervision.

So should you add ketamine to your practice or not?

It all depends. If the pros we shared resonate with you and the cons are non-issues for you or you know and believe you can figure out a way to address each one, then adding ketamine infusions to your practice is a great idea! There are so many patients out there that could be helped by YOU! However if you don’t feel these pros are strong enough and the con’s are insurmountable to you, we suggest you skip on the ketamine and look for other ways to expand your practice!

If you feel this is the right path for you, we want to support you in adding ketamine treatments to your medical practice. Join our email list and be notified about the next free webinar and open registration for Ketamine StartUp.

The Pros and Cons of Adding Ketamine Infusions To Your Practice

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