IV Ketamine for
Chronic Pain
When pain becomes the disease itself, ketamine targets the root cause — resetting the neural circuits that keep your nervous system locked in overdrive.
Schedule a Conversation →When pain becomes the disease itself, ketamine targets the root cause — resetting the neural circuits that keep your nervous system locked in overdrive.
Schedule a Conversation →Acute pain serves a purpose — it tells you to pull your hand off the stove, to rest a broken bone, to protect a wound while it heals. Chronic pain is different. It is pain that persists long after the original injury has healed, or pain that exists without any identifiable injury at all. After three months, pain stops being a symptom and starts becoming its own disease.
What happens in chronic pain is a process called central sensitization. Your spinal cord and brain have literally learned to amplify pain signals, turning the volume up on sensations that should not hurt and creating pain where there is no tissue damage. The nervous system becomes a broken amplifier, and no amount of ibuprofen or physical therapy can reach the source of the problem.
This is exactly where ketamine excels — because it works directly on the NMDA receptors that drive central sensitization.
CRPS is one of the most severe chronic pain conditions in medicine — a burning, relentless pain often triggered by a minor injury that then spirals out of all proportion. The affected limb may swell, change color, and become exquisitely sensitive to even the lightest touch. Ketamine has become one of the most studied and effective treatments for CRPS, with some patients achieving months of relief after a single infusion series.
Fibromyalgia involves widespread muscle pain, fatigue, and tender points throughout the body. It is fundamentally a disorder of central pain processing — the brain and spinal cord are amplifying normal sensory signals into pain. Because ketamine directly addresses central sensitization through NMDA receptor modulation, it can provide relief where traditional pain medications fall short.
Nerve damage from diabetes, shingles, surgery, or other causes can create burning, shooting, or electric-shock-like pain that is notoriously difficult to treat. Standard pain medications were not designed for neuropathic pain. Ketamine's mechanism of action — blocking NMDA receptors in the pain processing pathway — makes it uniquely suited for this type of pain.
For patients with migraines that have not responded to triptans, preventive medications, or Botox, ketamine infusions can help break the cycle of chronic headache. Ketamine modulates the glutamate signaling that drives migraine pathophysiology and can reduce both the frequency and intensity of attacks.
The NMDA (N-methyl-D-aspartate) receptor plays a central role in pain processing and the development of central sensitization. When these receptors are chronically activated — as they are in persistent pain states — they amplify pain signals and create a self-perpetuating cycle of increasing sensitivity.
In chronic pain, repeated nerve stimulation causes NMDA receptors to become progressively more responsive — a phenomenon called wind-up. Each pain signal makes the next one louder. Ketamine blocks NMDA receptors, interrupting this wind-up process and allowing the pain processing system to reset to a more normal baseline. This is not masking pain — it is addressing the mechanism that makes pain chronic.
One of the most important aspects of ketamine for chronic pain is its potential to reduce opioid dependence. Many chronic pain patients are trapped in a cycle of escalating opioid use that creates its own problems — tolerance, dependence, hyperalgesia. Ketamine works through a completely different pathway and can provide meaningful pain relief while supporting a reduction in opioid use.
Marla Peterson, CRNA, APRN, is a board-certified nurse anesthetist — and that background matters enormously for chronic pain treatment. Anesthesia professionals understand pain physiology at a level that few other providers can match, because managing pain is the foundation of their entire specialty.
Marla has administered ketamine thousands of times in hospital operating rooms for surgical anesthesia and pain management. She understands the pharmacokinetics, the dose-response curves, and the nuances of how different patients metabolize this medication. That depth of experience translates directly into safer, more precisely calibrated infusions for chronic pain patients.
Pain infusions may differ from mental health infusions in dosing and duration. Marla tailors every protocol to your specific condition, your pain history, and your treatment goals. There is no one-size-fits-all approach here.
A free phone consultation is all it takes to find out if ketamine therapy can help with your chronic pain condition. No pressure. No obligation. Just a real conversation about what's possible.
Schedule a Conversation →Or call us directly: (615) 988-4600
Monday – Friday 8am–5pm • Weekends 9am–5pm