Pasithea Clinics, a subsidiary of Miami-based biotech firm Pasithea Therapeutics, opened a West Hollywood clinic on Sept. 8 that will treat mental health conditions with ketamine therapy, psychotherapy and traditional psychiatry, among other services.
The clinic is the company’s only standing location; at-home services are available in San Francisco, San Diego, Miami and New York.
The 1,235-square-foot clinic is located on Sunset Blvd. in West Hollywood and has four treatment rooms and a team of health care providers that includes board-certified doctors, psychiatrists and anesthesiologists.
“My main goal in life is to provide new solutions for patients needing help with the mental health challenges they are facing,” Dr. Tiago Marques, the chief executive and co-founder of Pasithea, said in a statement. “Pasithea is innovating the way we treat psychiatric disorders and the opening of our Los Angeles clinic is the next step in revolutionizing care for those who are suffering.”
The “new solutions” championed by Marques and his company include the use of intravenous ketamine for the treatment of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Patients that meet eligibility criteria are given access to a team of Pasithea doctors who administer tailored doses of intravenous ketamine.
According to the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, Ketamine is one of the most promising new treatments for depression and has demonstrated its worth via two decades of research that showed low doses can improve depression.
“Searching for the right medication to manage mental health challenges can be a daunting process,” Dr. Yalda Safai, a telehealth psychiatrist at Pasithea, said in a statement. “The introduction of ketamine therapy to treat mental health conditions has been a revolutionary development that we hadn’t seen in the industry for years. We feel confident that our services will provide hope for those that hadn’t found the right treatment thus far.”
The Semel Institute also reported that ketamine doses used for the treatment of depression should not cause intense psychological experiences, but may cause temporary dissociation, sedation, impaired coordination and balance and dizziness or vertigo. It may also cause nausea or vomiting, headaches and increased heart rate and blood pressure for a short time after each dose.
Pasithea also provides Spravato, a nasal spray approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of depression. Psychotherapy, medication management and traditional psychiatric services are also available for patients.
Pasithea plans to add transcranial magnetic stimulation, a non-invasive form of brain stimulation, to its treatment repertoire later this month.
