In high school, they warned us of the dangers of date rape drugs such as Rohypnol, GHB and Ketamine. But current studies demonstrating the clinical uses of these once illicit drugs shed light for their uses as pharmacotheraputics. Rohypnol, or roofies, has been shown to be a potent hypnotic and is used in foreign countries to treat patients with severe insomnia. GHB is now FDA-approved to treat patients with narcolepsy. But what may be most intriguing is that Ketamine (aka Special K) has gone through several clinical trials that implicate it as a powerful antidepressant, working especially well in patients with treatment-resistant depression.
Sohail et al. (Fri,) studied this question.