Latest / Giving Pain Purpose with Lyndsay Soprano / Ketamine + Its Role in Matthew Perry's Death

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Ketamine + Its Role in Matthew Perry's Death · Giving Pain Purpose with Lyndsay Soprano

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This is Your Pain Game podcast where we talk about the game of living in
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and with chronic pain and trauma, getting to the heart of how to heal.
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I am your host, Lindsay Soprano. On the show, I plan
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on discussing with doctors, chronic pain patients, holistic practitioners, loved ones,
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and anybody that is interested in having their voice heard in the chronic pain and
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trauma world that we live in. On October twenty eighth of twenty twenty three,
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in Pacific Palisades, which is here in Los Angeles, we lost Matthew
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Perry, one of our six incredible friends, at the young age of fifty
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four years old. And as I'm turning forty six, that's kind of a
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scary number. And you know, the funny and sweet guy that we came
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to love so hard, Chandler Bing is forever in our hearts. Been continuously
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upset about his death for a multitude of reasons, and those of you who
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have listened to the show no all of those reasons. And if you have
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it and this is your first episode, then hop on board and go back
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a couple episodes. So back on January ninth, we distributed an episode with
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Sam Mendel. He's an expert in ketymine and the CEO and co founder of
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Ketamine Clinics of Los Angeles. That episode dropped on January ninth, where we
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discussed ketamine infusion therapy and psychedelics for mental health, chronic pain, depression,
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addiction, and more. And if you haven't had a chance to listen,
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you must. We recorded our episode prior to the autopsy report coming out that
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was released on December fifteenth for Matthew's cause of death, which was that he
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died of acute effects of ketamine. And it said and I quote that he
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drowned in the heated end of his pool at his Los Angeles home on October
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twenty eighth of coronary artery disease and the effects of an opioid view for nephrin
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in his also had been a contributing factor to his death. And that drug,
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when you google it is a synthetic opioid derived from the poppy flower to
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treat pain and opioid use disorders. So I want to get right back into
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it here because Sam was on that episode on January ninth, and so hey,
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Sam, thank you so much for taking a little bit of time out
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of your life to discuss this because I know we recorded before this info.
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Absolutely thank you for having me. It's definitely an important issue that a lot
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of people are paying attention to right now. Yeah, and I want to
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kind of like debunk any like icky, scary, gross narratives that are coming
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around this with Matthew Perry. A lot of the reasons why is because I'm
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starting ketmine infusion therapy and it was a little scary for me when I got
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when I saw the autopsy report and the first person I called you. So
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let's get right on into it here. So let's reassure our listeners that there's
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no connection between Matthew Perry's death and the therapeutic use of ketemine, and let's
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just go from there. Yeah, I mean there's a lot of issues here.
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I mean, first and foremost, we have to send our sincere condolences
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to you know, Matthew Perry's friends and family and the people who knew him
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personally. It's obviously a very sad loss. And it's a sad loss even
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for people who didn't know him personally, as you mentioned, who are fans
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and really admired him and his work. You know, the reporting on the
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autopsy is just misleading at best and kind of malicious at worst. You know,
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to say that he did from the acute effects of ketamine is just really
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not accurate. He drowned. He became incapacitated on multiple several sedatives that he
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was taking in conjunction, one of them ketamine in particular, and very very
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high doses by himself. No body water. I mean, it's just really
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really outside of anything that would be done in a therapeutic context, and to
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try to wrap it into ketamine for mental health or keademy for chronic pain,
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it's just really it's just flat out false and it's really unfortunate. In addition
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to the ketamine and the duprenorphine, the opiate opioid that he was taking,
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he also had Laurazepa, a benzo azipine is another sedative in his system,
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which is something interestingly enough that no one's really talking about a reporting. I
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know, I know because I read about the benzo side of it too,
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and I'm like, oh my god, what was really going on here?
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I mean, it was Matthew Perry wasn't a huge surprise to us. As
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bad as that is too yeah. I mean, he had shared publicly about
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his issues with you know, addiction and mental health struggles. You know,
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it seems that the that the benzo and the opioid were at reasonable levels.
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The ketamine was a very very high level, but still all three in combination
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is a serious issue, you know, and especially you know, the amount
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of academy that was in a system was enough to produce general anesthesia, and
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it's more than yeah, and it's more than ten times the amount that we
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provide for therapeutic use in the clinic. So you have someone taking ten times
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the amount in conjunction with other sedatives alone in a hot tub, in drowning.
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It's like, how can you even try to say that this is an
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apples to apples, you know situation here. And he had a as reported
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in the media, a Kenemine treatment about a week or ten days prior,
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and it was noted in the autopsy report. And then it even was stated
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there's no way that this could have had an impact because Kennemine's half life is
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so short and it's about three hours and the medicine gets out of the system
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very very quickly, so said there's no way that there could be any connection
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there, but just mentioning it made a connection there, and so then going,
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you know, so then people are going, oh, well wait a
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minute. So we had this you know, therapeutic kenemine treatment ten days prior,
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and so you know, is there is there some sort of issue with
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this treatment and did it cause this problem? And there's that just opened up
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a can of worms of concern and questioning. You know, we had patients
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who are scheduled to start who had said, hey, I heard about you
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know, Matt Perry, like, I don't know what do I need to
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know about this? Should I continue? Basically I'm afraid. And we had
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people who had said, you know, this treatment really helped me or really
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helped my husband, and we were so grateful for it, and now we're
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not so sure if this is actually like the safe thing for us to do.
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So this is just really sad, this kind of fear mongering. It's
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really really unfortunate. You know, patients are paying the price for it more
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than anyone. And the media loves to sensationalize things. They love to latch
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on to demonize ketamine really in any opportunity, and it's sad. It's unfortunate.
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The whole situation is very sad, and you know, it's important to
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us to disseminate accurate information. You know, so different than someone having one
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glass of wine, you know, in the evening versus someone having an entire
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fifth of vodka and then driving those you know, those two situations both involve
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alcohol, but very very drastically different use of alcohol. And so you know,
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I think this in some ways is maybe a little bit similar. You
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know, obviously the therapeutic clinical use being on part with you know, glass
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of wine at home on the couch versus a fifth of vodka in the car,
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which is more in alignment with what mister Perry did well. And that's
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why you're here today, because I really we all kind of got like whoa
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in the The first thing for me was immediately I thought about you, and
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I thought about our discussion with me starting these infusions. Of course, I
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am not scared, but I've also done a ton of research myself, and
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I've spoken to you many times as well, and so it's not scary to
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me. And I've got a girlfriend of mine who has cerps as well,
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and she does kind of mean that she does the pill form which we talked
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about on our episode. So can you talk to us a little bit about
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a couple of reasons And I know we talked about a little bit on the
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episode, but just for some people that haven't, can you talk about the
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therapeutic value from an IVY perspectives versus pill form and just a quick little dirty
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rundown of what it can do for people. Why we just should not be
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scared. We should not be scared to go see Sam. Guys, this
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should not be happening. Yeah, I mean, you know, Ketymine is
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an incredibly safe medicine and it's been around since the sixties. It was FDA
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proved for humans in nineteen seventy. It's been used you know, hundreds of
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millions, maybe even billions literally with a v of times. And in the
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last twenty twenty five years, there's been a substantial body of research proving its
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relatively newer use as a mental health treatment and as a chronic pain treatment for
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conditions like CRPS or our RSD and other neuropathic pain conditions. And there's over
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two hundred studies. So, you know, when people talk about this being
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anecdotal or they say, you know, yeah, it seems promising, but
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we need more, We need more data. You know, these are common
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phrases from some of the establishment that doesn't really necessarily want to see a change
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in the status quo. And the reality is, we have a lot of
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data, more than two hundred clinical trials on ketymine for mental health alone,
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not even counting all the others involving it for chronic pain, which in some
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ways the chronic pain uses have actually been going on longer because ketamine is used
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for more acute pain in place of opioids a lot of times in crisis situations,
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in emergency rooms, et cetera. And it can actually be much better
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than opioids for many people in many situations. And then you know, neuropathic
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pain, it's got really excellent use. As a matter of fact, it's
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really one of the only really good treatments available for true crps. It's just
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not really much out there, unfortunately for me. Yeah, and then you
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know, you get in these terrible cycles of opiate use, and that kind
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of requires more in higher doses and than the side effects. But I feel
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like I'm getting off track a little bit. The point I was trying to
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make is that this is a very well proven treatment. It's a very safe
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medicine. It's a medicine that's been around for a very long time. This
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is a relatively newer use for it, but it's also very very well researched
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and then with in addition to the clinical research which is all the leading institution's,
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highest level, most respected in the world, who have done at least
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one study on this, you know, there's a ton of anecdotal data too.
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There's tons of people doing this work in the real world. Like we've
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been doing for a decade now, we provided over thirty thousand infusions. We
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know a little bit about how this medicine affects people in that time a decade,
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thirty thousand infusion. We've been doing this day in and day out,
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so it's very safe and it's very effective. When someone has this treatment in
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a clinic at a reputable place, like at least in the way that we
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are doing it, they have hospital grade monitoring equipment for all their vitals,
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their pull socks, you know, EKG. Blood pressure, respiratory rate.
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They have direct supervision monitoring by licensed medical professionals. We have a great team
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of people, nurses, psychiatric nurse practitioners, psychiatrists, anesthesiologists, a large
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team. I mean there's over a dozen of us here, and they're all
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making sure that patients are both first and foremost safe and then comfortable in the
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experience. So there's you know, they're all trained and have advanced training and
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things like basic life support, advanced cardiac life support, and moderate sedation by
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the American Society of Anesthesiologists. So there's a lot that goes into the training
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and the safety and the professionalism, and it's still a very very safe medicine.
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I mean, you know, we haven't had a need for people to
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apply their their skills or their knowledge and emergency areas, but they have it
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and we're ready and we feel that that is the responsible thing to do.
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But when used responsibly in a clinical setting, there really aren't situations that come
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up where people need to put those skills to use because it's such a safe
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drug and we're using a really small amount of it. I mean, it's
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the number one sedative for pediatric cases for children because of the safe it is.
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So chances are if you have a kid and they need to get a
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procedure done where they need to be sedated, they're gonna have ketamine. I
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mean, that's how safe that it is. I also want to point something
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out that I don't think we talked about last time, which is ketemine actually
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has a very large therapeutic index. When the therapeutic index for drugs is the
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amount that it requires to produce the it's the gap. It's the difference between
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the amount required to produce a therapeutic response and the amount that's lethal. So
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when you take drugs like no they deal like opioids are fentanyl for example.
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You know, fentanyl obviously killing a lot of people all over the country and
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all over the world today and causing a whole lot of harm. In the
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right context, you can argue it's a beneficial medicine when it's used, you
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know, in biomedical professional in certain cases. And the thing about fennel,
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though, is that you just need the tiniest little bit. I mean,
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the amount size of a grain of rice can kill someone. So the difference
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between what's good and helpful and what's deadly is very very small, very small
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margin of air. Even if you're a professional, you really got you can't
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make a mistake there, and just being off by the tiniest bit can literally
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mean death, whereas with ketamine it's a huge therapeutic index. There's I don't
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even know if there is actually a known lethal amount. In reality, someone
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might become sedated in a bad environment, like in a body of water and
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drown. They might do something foolish in a car or in another environment where
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they could get hurt or die. But the actual death by the drug,
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you don't hear of those cases. And the people who have overdose and issues
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with ketymine are almost always mixing it with other drugs. So yeah, I
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mean national whole thing with Matthew Perry, I mean his clinician was his dog
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sitting on the side of his JACOUSI yeah, yeah. So you know,
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you look at alcohol related deaths, and you know, annually at one hundred
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and forty thousand per year. You know, you look at deaths related to
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opioids and other overdose cases, you know, around one hundred and twenty thousand
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a year. I looked at a meta analysis that showed around three hundred and
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fifty deaths by ketymine. They were virtually all mixed with other drugs, and
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there was not one single case that I could find of someone dying from ketymine
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in a clinical environment, not one. So I think that says a lot
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about ketymine, and I think it also says a lot about the you know,
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the media, and the kind of people who are looking to protect their
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financial and other interests. In the status quote, we don't really want to
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see ketymine become as widespread as it should be. That was very well put.
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Sam. Yeah, we know what he's saying, because I have no
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problem saying it. I'm the one that watches pain Hustlers and has watched all
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of these unbelievable movies about pushing opiates on people, and as you know and
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as my listeners know, I don't touch the stuff. And so it's unbelievable
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how ketymine got such a bad name so quickly, just because of Matthew Perry.
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And I understand that. And that's why we're here today, because I
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believe you. I believe in ketamine and I haven't even started it yet,
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because I have read a lot of the data. I have gone through some
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of those studies because that's the kind of nerd I am. Because I'm sick
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and tired of doctors and clinics and clinicians, not thinking about harm, not
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thinking about how this is actually going to affect me down the road. And
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that is something that you and your clinic harm reduction, harm prevention has been
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at the at the center of all that you do, which is incredible.
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Like I know, in speaking with you, because you're so eloquent about what
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you say, and I know it's this part of your job to speak eloquently
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about what you do. But I feel so confident in you and in your
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clinic and in your approach to care that I don't see all that often,
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at least from my perspective. So I just wanted to say, I just
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wanted to, you know, give you that little cud well. Thank you
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for that. I really appreciate it. I mean, we're very passionate about
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what we do, you know what. I'm passionate about what I do,
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and I've been doing this for a decade. I've really devoted my life to
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it. And you know, the reason I came to this work is the
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friends and family I have who have struggled and suffered and people who have lost.
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So it's personal work and I know it on all sides, you know,
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and all around you know, for people who are listening wondering, well,
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if kind of beans so wonderful, then why are people wanting to bash
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it? Or why would why would people not want it to be more widespread?
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Well, you know, unfortunately, a lot of the people that are
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in positions of power are not really operating based on what's just for the greater
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good. They're not systems. And it's not just to diss any individual,
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but the systems we have are are designed to not incentivize that, you know,
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And that's the problem. Our healthcare is failing us so hugely in the
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United States. I mean, we spend like, sometimes upwards of more than
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ten times what other developed nations spend on healthcare, and our outcomes, our
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health outcomes are awful. I mean, we can be on the of you
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know, on a list of fifty, we can be at like thirty,
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thirty five, forty in terms of the quality of the care, but number
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one on multiples of number one of what we're spending. I mean, how
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does that compute? How does that make sense. We're the most advanced,
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wealthiest nation in the history of the world, and we're spending more on this
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than anyone else, but we're getting worse results. How does that add up?
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Well, it adds up because it's about profit and power and control,
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not about healing people, not about good care. Keta means patent is up.
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It's a cheap generic drug. No, it's its margins are very small.
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Everybody in the system is incentivized to maximize profit and control of market.
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And you can't do that with kennymine. So that's the truth. You know.
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I don't know if I could say it any more bluntly than that,
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but that's the reality. Well I think I could, but I think you
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did it more eloquently. I'm trying, you know, everybody knows me though,
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I'm trying. You know, Oh man, I know well, and
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it's such a good it's such a I know what we are. We're short
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on time here today because we just wanted to come in and pop in into
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into the show here because I just found it to be just as a follow
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up to us, because I find that anybody that would have listened to the
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first episode that drop would be like, well wait a second, what the
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hell? And so I wanted to make sure that we brought you back on
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to do so. And I appreciate that so much and it helps me too.
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Even though I already talk to you about it, it still helps me
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to hear it, to see your cute little face and your smile and all
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of that. And I know how passionate you are, and I know that
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you give a shit, and that is something that is not as easy to
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find because we are surrounded by sick care. We're not surrounded by healthcare.
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We're not we're not set for good outcomes or except for like, oh,
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okay, how many opiates did I sell this week? Have you watched the
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Pain Hustlers movie yet on Netflix? No? I don't think so. Okay,
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well you need to do it. It's your homework. Yeah, yeah,
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I mean, you see this with incentives with I mean, and you
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know, even you look at the fines and fees you know that are like
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purduing others have paid and stuff, and it's like it's like dropping the bucket
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for them. They just made, they just printed so much money. And
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then you know it's like, oh, slap on the wrist and pay all
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these and it's like they're still doing just fine, they're doing great. Actually,
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they're doing absolutely. It's really sad, you know, it's really unfortunate.
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It's unfortunate you look at well. I don't want to get I don't
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want to go too off track here, but I really want people to and
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I think people are kind of waking up to this, and I want people
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to be empowered to do their homework, do their research to understand the nature
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of how the systems are created and how people are playing their part within them,
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just so that they can at least be informed and you know, try
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to advocate really for themselves for their own health and wellness. And it's not
19:07
easy. And I'm not saying that you have to do everything yourself or go
19:10
get a medical degree. I mean, obviously there are doctors and healthcare systems
19:15
and professionals out there who really care and who are trying to do the right
19:18
thing. And you know, there's good people all around the world, right
19:21
So I'm not saying don't trust anyone. I just am saying, wake up
19:25
to some of the really unfortunate ways that the systems that we have in the
19:27
US are built, because they're not all always operating in the consumer's best interest.
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Well said, they definitely are not. So okay, so we're going
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to well, as I mentioned, I am starting the Kedemine IV infusion therapy
19:47
at this particular clinic actually, and I've looked at multiples, even out of
19:52
the state, because my Sweedie, and I have said, okay, so
19:53
we just go to another state and we just like run out hotel room or
19:56
we get an airbnb. Like We've looked in all the place, and this
20:00
is the first place that I have fallen in love with, and then I
20:03
have felt confident and secure that I am going to because I know with CRPS
20:07
and for my kind of conditions, it's not the shorter version of the ivy
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and fission. It's a dedicated time for us to like kick it for six
20:15
hours together multiple times. The treatment is not invasive, but it's lengthy.
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You know what, I don't give a crap because I have spent I'm not
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even tell you guys how much money that we have spent on my body over
20:27
the past eight years. But it is like three houses, maybe not in
20:33
southern California, but it's three houses somewhere. And you know, it's gotten
20:37
to the point where I just stopped going to doctors, I stopped taking any
20:41
pills, I stopped supplements. I just went to absolute ground zero. And
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that's where I'm at right now, there is nothing in my body except for
20:48
a multiple vitamin. That's it. Because I wanted to start clean and fresh.
20:52
While I started that a couple of months ago, but I wanted to
20:56
start clean and fresh for this year to make sure that my body was ready
20:59
to for what I've been building up to to do in twenty twenty four.
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And you're part of that. And so I am just blessed to have met
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you, and thank you so much again for taking the quick time. Is
21:08
there anything that you want to just quick leave us before we jam out of
21:11
here? No, I just really applaud you for your you know, your
21:15
energy and enthusiasm and positivity. You're always, you know, a delight to
21:18
talk with, and you know, considering everything that you're dealing with and going
21:22
through, I just I admire and I respect that your your you know,
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resilience and doing this meaningful work and helping to educate people and inspire people and
21:30
sharing your story is really amazing. So thank you for that. Oh you're
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welcome, and thank you for your stories as well. And to my guests
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and listeners, you guys are all part of this. And like Sam mentioned
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earlier, the healing properties of ketamine and the healing, the healing, the
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healing. That's what we talk about on this show all of the time as
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we're here for hope and healing, and that is what Sam is giving us.
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So thank you again for your time with us. You can find Sam
21:56
and the ketamin Clinic Ketamine Clinics dot com. He's on insta at the Sam
22:00
Mandel M A N D E. L. He's everywhere inst Twitter, linked
22:03
Twitter, what do we call it now? X give me up X,
22:07
LinkedIn webs's website, Academy clinics dot com, TikTok. He's everywhere, there,
22:12
everywhere. If you google them, you will find a multitude of information
22:15
out there. There are press releases, there are videos, he's been interviewed,
22:18
He and his dad, I mean it, kids all over the place
22:22
on top of this topic because it is that important for us all to know
22:26
about. So thank you again for your time today, and thank you so
22:29
much for all that you're doing for the pain community and for everybody else that
22:32
needs you. Thank you, Lindsey, appreciate you. You got it.
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Thank you you too, and Happy New Year, Happy New Year. You
22:37
are exclusively invited to share this therapeutic and safe hetamine infused VIP pain journey together.
22:45
Let's get to the heart of how to heal with you by my side.
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Please follow the Pain Game Podcast wherever you digest your podcast content, we
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