This club drug could alleviate severe depression in as little as 2 hours

When it comes to coping with severe depression, many patients are prescribed standard antidepressants like Prozac or Wellbutrin. But for those who are among the roughly 30 percent of depressed patients who don't respond to standard antidepressants, the situation is far more dire.

An in-depth report from Bloomberg details how the club drug ketamine — known on the street as Special K — could be useful in alleviating severe depression in patients who have had little success with more traditional drugs. Though ketamine hasn't been approved by the FDA, Bloomberg discusses multiple studies and real-life anecdotes that seem to indicate that ketamine "works by producing long-lasting changes in the brain, reversing neural damage caused by stress and depression, and potentially decreasing inflammation and cortisol levels." Furthermore, while traditional medication can take weeks or even months to take effect, many patients who receive ketamine infusions feel some relief in mere hours.

"It was the moment of my life," Dennis Hartman, who had already scheduled his suicide when he decided to try ketamine infusions, told Bloomberg. "Within a few hours I could tell that my anxiety and depression were completely gone for the first time in my memory."

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While the drug undoubtedly comes with risks and doesn't work for everyone, clinics are popping up across the nation and companies are working to develop what Bloomberg says would be "similar, patentable drugs." "When it works," New Jersey psychiatrist Steven Levine told Bloomberg, "it's tremendous, it's wonderful."

Read the story in full at Bloomberg.