Ketamine is not administered in Brandon. Ascend has one dosing suite, at 27724 Cashford Circle, Suite 102, Wesley Chapel, FL 33544, and nothing on this page should be read as suggesting a Brandon treatment room exists. What Brandon patients do have is full access to the assessment itself, and to the same prescriber who directs every dosing session afterward. The psychiatric evaluation that decides whether ketamine suits your case can be done by Florida telehealth from home. Call (813) 670-3005 or book a consultation.
What gets measured, and when we would stop
Response is not judged by how you describe the week in general terms. Symptom scores are recorded at the evaluation and repeated through the series, so the comparison at the fourth session is against your own baseline rather than against memory. Depression severity, anxiety and sleep are tracked separately, because they rarely move at the same rate and averaging them hides what is actually happening.
The pattern seen most often is an early shift in sleep and in the physical flatness that comes with depression, before mood itself changes. That ordering is useful information: it indicates the medication is doing something even when the week still felt bad. The opposite pattern, scores unchanged across the first four sessions, is treated as information too. Anna Stouffer reviews those numbers with you at that point, and the conversation is explicitly about whether to continue rather than about scheduling the next two.
There is a stopping rule and you hear it before the first dose. A completed induction series that produces no measurable change ends the ketamine question rather than opening a longer one. The compounded preparation is not FDA-approved and the agency has reviewed neither its effectiveness nor its manufacturing quality, which is part of why an absence of response is taken at face value instead of being pushed through with extra sessions. Where the series does help, the maintenance interval is set by how long the effect actually holds for you rather than by a fixed calendar.
If your primary care doctor raised this
A good number of Brandon patients arrive because a family physician mentioned ketamine after the second or third antidepressant did not do enough. That is a reasonable referral pathway and it usually means the groundwork is already there. Bring the record.
The evaluation turns almost entirely on specifics: which medications, at what doses, for how long, and what actually happened on each. Treatment-resistant depression generally means an inadequate response to two or more antidepressants taken at therapeutic doses for an adequate trial. A referring note that says depression is not improving is a starting point; a medication list with dates and doses is what actually lets a recommendation get made.
Anna Stouffer, MS, PMHNP-BC, FNP-BC conducts that evaluation and directs every dose afterward. She is dual board-certified in psychiatric-mental health and family practice, which means the cardiovascular and medication side of candidacy is assessed in the same appointment instead of bouncing you back to your primary care office for clearance. Costs are discussed when we call you back rather than published here, because they depend on what the evaluation concludes you need.
What the evaluation is deciding
Not whether you want ketamine. Whether it is a defensible next step for your specific history, and whether anything makes it unsafe. Those are different questions and the second one can end the conversation regardless of the first.
Treatment-resistant depression is the primary and most studied indication. PTSD is considered after trauma-focused therapy and first-line medication have been tried. Severe anxiety resistant to standard treatment, OCD after exposure and response prevention and medication trials, bipolar depression with additional assessment, and select chronic pain conditions are each weighed individually on a thinner evidence base. None are assessed as certain to respond.
If it is appropriate, the structure is an induction series of six sessions across roughly two to three weeks, then a maintenance interval set by how you actually respond rather than by a fixed calendar. Some patients need no maintenance at all. If ketamine is not appropriate, you hear that directly, and because this is a full psychiatric practice the alternative conversation happens here rather than starting over elsewhere.
The medication, and what its FDA status means
Ketamine is not FDA-approved to treat depression, PTSD, anxiety, OCD, or chronic pain. The preparation used at Ascend is compounded, meaning a pharmacy assembles it rather than a manufacturer making a finished reviewed product, and a compounded medication is not FDA-approved for any use. The agency has not reviewed what you would be given for safety, for effectiveness, or for manufacturing quality. You will hear this again at the evaluation and it is named in the consent you sign before a first dose.
Two consequences matter in practice. First, nothing is mailed and no supply is issued for you to take at home. The agency has warned publicly about compounded ketamine sent out for unsupervised self-administration, and every dose here is prepared for in-clinic use and given in the clinic. Second, ketamine is a Schedule III controlled substance with genuine potential for misuse and dependence, so dosing frequency is set by the practice and reassessed at each follow-up rather than left open-ended.
A limit on the evidence, stated plainly: most published research used infusion administration rather than the subcutaneous route given here, so what the trials found applies by inference. Ascend does not offer nasal-spray or at-home programs of any kind, and the fact that the compounded preparation is not FDA-approved is part of why the monitoring around it is not optional.
Side effects, and the list that rules people out
Most effects are short-lived and settle before you are discharged: temporary dizziness or nausea, brief increases in heart rate and blood pressure, altered perception or mild euphoria during the active window, occasionally a headache or fatigue in the hours afterward. Dissociation during the dose is expected rather than a warning sign, which is why you are monitored continuously and not left alone.
Conditions screened during the consultation that can make ketamine inappropriate include severe or uncontrolled cardiovascular disease, uncontrolled hypertension, active psychosis or a documented history of a primary psychotic disorder, active or untreated substance use disorders, and pregnancy. Bring a complete current medication list including anything over the counter. Benzodiazepines are the interaction discussed most often, and stimulants, several blood pressure medications and MAOIs are all reviewed.
Ketamine therapy is scheduled care, assessed over weeks. It is not an emergency intervention. If you are in immediate danger, call or text 988.
Evidence worth knowing before you decide
The foundational randomized controlled trial (Zarate CA Jr, et al., Archives of General Psychiatry, 2006) first showed a rapid antidepressant effect in treatment-resistant patients, acting through NMDA receptor antagonism and glutamate signaling rather than the serotonin route most antidepressants take. A two-site randomized controlled trial (Murrough JW, et al., American Journal of Psychiatry, 2013) reported 64% of participants meeting response criteria at 24 hours against 28% on an active midazolam control. For anxiety, a controlled trial (Glue P, et al., Journal of Psychopharmacology, 2017) found dose-related reductions in symptom scores among patients with treatment-refractory anxiety disorders, on a smaller and earlier-stage evidence base than the depression work.
Those numbers describe research cohorts under research conditions. They are not a prediction about you, and ketamine remains not FDA-approved for any of these conditions regardless of what a trial reported. Some patients respond, some partially, and a real minority get nothing meaningful from a full series, which is discussed openly at follow-up rather than met with more appointments.
Brandon questions
Does Ascend have a Brandon location for the dosing sessions?
No. There is no ketamine dosing suite in Brandon at Ascend, or anywhere else in eastern Hillsborough. Every session happens at the Wesley Chapel suite, 27724 Cashford Circle, Suite 102. Brandon patients are evaluated through the practice, often by Florida telehealth, and are seen at Wesley Chapel for the dosing sessions themselves.
Can I get an evaluation without committing to treatment?
Yes, and that is the intended use of it. The consultation is an assessment, not an enrollment. It may conclude that ketamine is a reasonable next step, or that something else should come first, or that a contraindication rules it out. All three are normal outcomes and you are not obligated to book anything afterward.
Why not just use one of the infusion clinics closer to home?
That is a legitimate option and worth weighing on its merits. The differences to ask about anywhere, including here, are who performs the evaluation and whether they are a licensed prescriber, whether the same clinician is present for every session, what is monitored during and after dosing, and what happens if the induction series produces nothing. Ascend uses a subcutaneous injection rather than an infusion, and the same prescriber directs every visit.
How long am I actually at the clinic?
About two hours per session: roughly fifteen minutes of check-in and baseline vital signs, forty to sixty minutes of active dose time in a private room, then twenty to thirty minutes of recovery observation before discharge. Plan on the rest of the day being unavailable, since you cannot drive yourself home and most patients feel tired or foggy for several hours afterward.
Is the dissociation during a session something to worry about?
It is expected rather than a warning sign, and it is the part most people ask about beforehand. During the active window the sense of time, body and surroundings commonly shifts, and for most patients it has settled well before discharge. You are monitored continuously and never left alone, which is the reason a session is structured the way it is. Say so during the visit if the experience is distressing rather than waiting it out, because both the dose and the setting can be adjusted for the next one. A frightening session is a reason to change the plan, not a reason to endure five more. Recovery observation ends when you are cleared rather than at a fixed time, and we will not discharge you to drive yourself.
Will insurance cover any of it?
Possibly part of the consultation, rarely the sessions. Coverage for racemic ketamine is inconsistent and usually out of network, and we do not bill insurance for the ketamine sessions themselves. The psychiatric consultation may be partially covered by in-network psychiatric benefits depending on your plan. See our insurance and payment page.
Neighboring service-area pages: Valrico and Riverview in south Hillsborough. For how a dosing day is actually run, see the Wesley Chapel ketamine page, and for the service overview, ketamine therapy at Ascend.
References
- Zarate CA Jr, Singh JB, Carlson PJ, et al. A randomized trial of an N-methyl-D-aspartate antagonist in treatment-resistant major depression. Archives of General Psychiatry. 2006;63(8):856-864.
- Murrough JW, Iosifescu DV, Chang LC, et al. Antidepressant efficacy of ketamine in treatment-resistant major depression: a two-site randomized controlled trial. American Journal of Psychiatry. 2013;170(10):1134-1142.
- Glue P, Medlicott NJ, Harland S, et al. Ketamine's dose-related effects on anxiety symptoms in patients with treatment refractory anxiety disorders. Journal of Psychopharmacology. 2017;31(10):1302-1305.