For adults with treatment-resistant depression who achieved stable remission or response after 16 weeks of esketamine nasal spray plus an oral antidepressant, continuing esketamine plus the antidepressant delayed relapse significantly more than switching to placebo plus the antidepressant. Among those in stable remission, 26.7% relapsed on esketamine versus 45.3% on placebo, a 51% reduction in relapse risk. Among stable responders, 25.8% relapsed on esketamine versus 57.6% on placebo, a 70% reduction. Common side effects of esketamine included transient taste disturbance, vertigo, dissociation, drowsiness, and dizziness.
During propofol-induced unconsciousness, the brain's electrical activity patterns—EEG microstates—change in ways that can distinguish between resting, light, and deep anesthesia. Analyzing 60-channel EEG from 31 male subjects, the study identified 7 common and 2 anesthesia-specific microstate templates. Features such as the occurrence and duration of certain microstates decreased as consciousness suppression deepened. Machine learning models using these features classified the three consciousness levels with a mean accuracy of 85.6%. The findings suggest that microstate analysis may help reveal the neural mechanisms underlying propofol anesthesia and could provide useful markers for quantifying levels of consciousness.