Ketamine Infusions for Chronic Pain: How Do They Work?

Instead of greeting each day with enthusiasm, your reaction is far more reserved as you wonder whether pain will be present, and how much it will affect your day.

This morning routine is one you share with millions of Americans. Nearly one-quarter of adults in the United States report chronic pain, about 8.5% of whom are dealing with severe and high impact pain that limits their lives.

Wherever you fall on the pain and limitation scale, know that there are effective pain relief solutions, including ketamine infusion therapy, which we offer here at Apex Pain Specialists. Our providers — Dr. Maziar Massrour and Dr. Naveen Reddy — are both board certified in pain management and anesthesiology, and they ensure that patients have options when it comes to chronic pain.

So, if you feel that your current therapy isn’t working, read on to learn more about ketamine infusion therapy and how it can alleviate your chronic pain.

Defining chronic pain

While it may seem obvious, we want to dive into chronic pain a little bit so that you have a better understanding about why it can be difficult to treat.

Technically, chronic pain is pain that lasts for six months or more, but there are plenty of exceptions to this rule. For example, you can be diagnosed with osteoarthritis, which is a degenerative condition that will only progress. So, the pain you feel now may qualify as chronic since it’s not going anywhere.

Another aspect that should always be considered is that chronic pain often takes on a life of its own. The pain might have started out as an acute problem, but it can often persist after the initial underlying issue resolves itself. This happens when pain pathways become overactive and continue to signal, leaving you stuck in a pain cycle.

Getting pain relief through ketamine

The first thing to know about ketamine is that it was introduced in the 1960s as an anesthetic. So, its pain relieving qualities have an incredibly long and successful track record for supplying immediate and meaningful pain relief.

In scientific terms, ketamine targets and blocks glutamate from triggering the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors in your brain. This glutamate suppression encourages a more relaxed state and ketamine works directly on your central nervous system to block pain.

In higher doses, ketamine can also work on opioid receptors in your brain to further suppress pain.

Ketamine and chronic pain

While ketamine excels in quickly addressing acute pain, we’ve found that ketamine infusion therapy can have a longer-term effect on the brain, helping people to break out of dysfunctional pain and mood regulation cycles.

Ketamine not only blocks pain, it encourages newer, healthier neural pathways to form that are involved in pain signaling.

Ketamine can address chronic inflammation as well, which is a big culprit behind chronic pain.

The advantages of ketamine infusion therapy 

We’ve established that ketamine works very well in helping people to find much-needed relief from chronic pain and inflammation, but there are other benefits.

For example, ketamine infusion therapy can help reduce the need for opioid-based painkillers. Opioid medications carry a big risk as up to 19% of people who take them develop an addiction. 

With ketamine infusion therapy, we deliver the ketamine via an IV placed in our office. When the infusion is complete, a friend or family member will drive you home, and you should begin to enjoy some pain relief.

As you proceed with additional treatments, you will notice greatly reduced pain as your brain continues to enjoy a more relaxed state thanks to healthier neural connections that don’t focus on pain. And this effect grows with each infusion.

If you’d like to see for yourself whether ketamine infusion therapy might hold the key to relieving your chronic pain, please call our office in Chandler, Arizona, at 480-820-7246 or book an appointment online today.