Ketamine for Refractory Chronic Migraine: a Pilot Study

• Status: Completed
• Trial end date: 2020-01-01
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

Ketamine is a drug used for anesthesia but at low doses it is a very effective pain reliever in several chronic conditions. Preliminary studies have shown that ketamine might be effective for patients with refractory chronic migraine, which is a severe type of headache for which patients usually have tried and failed many medications and can cause severe disability to their lives. This study will evaluate ketamine prospectively when given to patients who have "failed" an initial inpatient treatment.

• Phase: Early Phase 1
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: No

Details

• Lead Sponsor: Thomas Jefferson University
• Treatments: Ketamine

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• All adult patients (age 18 years and older) who meet the criteria of refractory chronic migraine as defined by the International Classification of Headache Disorders-II definition who present to the Jefferson Headache Center after failing an inpatient course of treatment at Methodist.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Schizophrenia

• active psychosis

• pregnancy

• poorly controlled cardiovascular disease

• cirrhosis

• previous treatment with intravenous ketamine

These criteria are all consistent with the 2018 Consensus Guidelines for Ketamine. Patients who are deemed poor candidates for ketamine by a study team member for any reason, such as intolerance of prior neuroleptic medications, may be excluded.