Ketamine Treatment in Charlotte, North Carolina

In Charlotte, NC, 17% of adults in the county report being diagnosed with depression—an estimated 138,00 people. There is a strong possibility that more people have depression but have gone undiagnosed. In Mecklenburg County, suicide is the seventh leading cause of death among all age groups. In fact, in 2015, 15% of high school students reported making a plan to commit suicide at one point in their lives. Suicide is the leading cause of death for those aged 15-24 years old.

COPE is the leading provider of ketamine infusions in Charlotte, North Carolina. Treatment is provided by our trained MDs in established, professional medical practices. Ketamine is emerging as an effective off-label treatment for Anxiety, Depression, OCD, PTSD and Chronic Pain. Read more about why you should consider ketamine treatment if you’ve tried traditional medications with no success. Ketamine treatment is helping to improve mental health in Charlotte, North Carolina – read how.

Ketamine Infusions: Competitive Pricing, Flexible Scheduling, and Fewer Side Effects

Ketamine Infusions are often a treatment that you try when you’re at the end of your rope, when you feel like you have tried everything else. It is giving people with treatment-resistant mental health conditions renewed hope. It’s also a popular treatment option in Charlotte, North Carolina, for these mental health conditions because it offers relief from the condition without some of the side effects including weight gain. COPE makes accessing ketamine treatment a safe and comfortable experience. Our pricing is competitive and appointments can be scheduled flexibly around your schedule.

Ketamine Infusion Therapy: How It Works

Ketamine is an innovative, cutting-edge medication for difficult to treat cases of depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorders, among others. We specialize in ketamine treatments for OCD patients.  It was originally developed as an anesthetic, and approved by the FDA for such use in 1970.  Ketamine has since been discovered to have many other uses in medicine, including as a solution for treatment-resistant psychiatric illness.

The Treatment Process

To receive ketamine treatment, you must first be screened by one of our local Charlotte psychiatric experts, to ensure that this is an appropriate treatment for you.  Once approved and scheduled, you arrive at our office 15 minutes in advance to complete any remaining paperwork.  At your scheduled time, you will be escorted into a private room, with a comfortable, plush seat, and offered your choice of entertainment, including: cable television, Netflix, iPads and wifi, as well as coffee and water. We will do everything we can to make your treatment as comfortable and welcoming as possible.

Your ketamine treatment, which is administered via IV infusion, will last 40 minutes, and you will be asked to remain at the Charlotte COPE office for an additional hour for observation.  Once released, we ask that you have a friend or family member drive you home; alternatively, we are happy to help you arrange a taxi or Uber ride home.

Duration of Treatment

For the first two weeks of treatment, you will come in three times a week for an IV ketamine infusion (each being a 40-minute session, followed by a one-hour observation period.) You may find that you can then maintain remission of your illness on more traditional psychiatric medications.  Some patients, however, may need to come in for maintenance treatments, which will occur every week for four weeks. The sustained phase is once a month for six months (if necessary).

COPE offers ketamine or esketamine (Spravato) treatment in North Carolina at our practice in Charlotte directed by Kurian Abraham, MD.

Kurian Abraham, MD, is a Diplomate of ABPN (American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology). Dr. Abraham obtained his Medical Degree and pulmonology fellowship from KEM Hospital Bombay, Psychiatry residency from EVMS Norfolk, Virginia, and Fellowship in Neuro-Psychopharmacology and New drug development from Duke University (Duke/Glaxo-Smith Kline Fellow). Dr. Abraham is the Medical Director of New Hope Clinical Research at 3101 Latrobe Drive, Charlotte 28211 and trains all the investigators of New Hope Clinical Research. Dr.Abraham has extensive experience in all phases of clinical trials from Phase I-IV. Dr. Abraham has been involved with at least 100+ protocols as Independent Principal Investigator and another 100+ protocols as Sub-Investigator while at Duke as a fellow.

Jonathan Davidson M.D. was Dr. Abraham’s preceptor at Duke. Andrew Johnston PharmD, Alan Metz M.D., Robert Leadbetter M.D., and Jack Modell M.D. were the preceptors at GSK.

As a Duke/GSK fellow, Dr. Abraham relentlessly worked hard at the Anxiety and Trauma Division at Duke under Dr. Davidson to validate CAPS (Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale) and DTS (Davidson’s Trauma Scale). As a fellow at GSK Dr. Abraham’s project was anticonvulsant Lamotrigine (Lamictal) as a mood stabilizer and prophylaxis for the prevention of Manic Episodes in Bipolar Disorder and FDA approved Lamotrigine for that indication.

Dr. Abraham has won awards for most outstanding resident for Research during his residency and has many publications to his credit.