What is it?
Phencyclidine and ketamine are psychoactive (mind-altering) substances that affect how you think and behave. Ketamine is a hallucinogen that alters your awareness, senses and perceptions. It also increases your heart rate and blood pressure. Phencyclidine and ketamine are made synthetically in laboratories. Sometimes these drugs are called dissociative anesthetics. Phencyclidine (PCP) and ketamine are sometimes called “club drugs”.
This refers to substances often used at rave parties and nightclubs.
In its pure form, phencyclidine is a white crystalline powder that easily dissolves in water. However, most phencyclidine on the street is tan/brown in color, powdery or gummy in consistency, and is typically transported in small foil wraps. Phencyclidine is most commonly sold as a powder or liquid, and applied to a leafy material such as oregano, parsley, mint, or marijuana and then smoked. It may also be injected, snorted or taken by mouth.
In its pure form ketamine comes in a vial as a clear liquid and as a white or off-white powder. Powdered ketamine typically is packaged in small glass vials, small plastic bags, and capsules as well as paper, or aluminum foil folds. Powdered ketamine is cut into lines known as bumps and snorted (e.g., sniffed through a straw), or it is smoked, typically in marijuana or tobacco cigarettes. Liquid ketamine can be injected or mixed into drinks, and sometimes people inject it.
While phencyclidine and ketamine were originally created for medical purposes, today they are often thought of in terms of recreational substance use. Typically, the street forms of these drugs are made in uncontrolled laboratories and come as pills, powder or liquid. Some people use phencyclidine or ketamine to experience unusual sensory perceptions. But like other drugs, they can be harmful.
How does it work?
Both phencyclidine and ketamine are similar in that they affect the action of naturally-occurring brain chemicals (neurotransmitters) glutamate, acetylcholine and dopamine that play a role in regulating your mood, energy and the way we experience the world. It is important to remember that these drugs have different effects on different people. Some people may feel happy and relaxed while others may feel anxious and restless. Some of the factors that influence how phencyclidine or ketamine will affect you include your past experiences with these drugs, present mood and surroundings, and mental and physical health condition.
For phencyclidine, the onset of effects is rapid and often occurs within a few minutes of taking the drug, though taking it by mouth results in a slightly slower onset of effects. Intoxication may last 4–8 hours after recreational doses, with some users reporting subjective effects for 24–48 hours.
For ketamine, the onset of effects is rapid and often occurs within a few minutes of taking the drug, though taking it by mouth results in a slightly slower onset of effects. Effects are relatively short in duration, lasting approximately 30 to 60 minutes
What are the associated risks and health effects?
Because the drugs are made or distributed in uncontrolled conditions, there is no way to know what’s mixed in them. Using one of these drugs is always risky because you can never know for sure what you are putting in your body. Some drugs can look similar to one another and a user can also never be sure about the concentration of the drug they are buying. The people selling the drugs may say they are offering one kind of drug but actually giving another. This makes it hard to tell which drug is which or what each drug contains. It’s not uncommon for a person to buy and use a drug that they didn’t want or that is mixed with other drugs or toxic additives they didn’t know about.
Phencyclidine use often causes you to feel distant and estranged from his surroundings. It can alter your mood states in an unpredictable fashion, causing some individuals to become detached, and others to become animated. Intoxicated individuals may act in an unpredictable fashion, possibly driven by false beliefs (delusions) and hallucinations or impaired judgment.
Other effects can include feelings of rage, skin redness (erythema), dilated pupils, memory loss (amnesia), sideways movement of the eyeballs when moving the head from side to side (nystagmus) and skin dryness.
A couple of minutes after taking ketamine, you may experience an increase in heart rate and blood pressure that gradually decreases over the next 10 to 20 minutes. Ketamine can make you unresponsive to stimuli. When in this state, you may experience involuntarily rapid eye movement, dilated pupils, salivation, tear secretions, and stiffening of the muscles. This drug can also cause nausea.
Ketamine may also cause agitation, depression, memory loss (amnesia) and problems with thinking. An overdose of ketamine can cause unconsciousness and dangerously slowed breathing. Over time, regular use of ketamine is linked with urinary and bladder problems. Drug-induced comas increase the risk of negative effects on the brain, especially the developing brains of adolescents and young adults. Drug use, especially regular use, by young people has particular risks. Like other psychoactive drugs, phencyclidine and ketamine can interfere with normal brain development. Early use can also interfere with developing normal patterns of social interaction with peers and have a negative impact on well-being.
If you experiment with drugs like phencyclidine and ketamine you risk getting hooked on trying to achieve the original high you felt the first time you used them. You also risk relying on using them too often for their short-term, anti-depressant effects. The more you use, the more tolerant your body becomes and the greater your risk of developing a physical or psychological dependence. Physical dependence can lead to severe withdrawal symptoms. Dependence on any drug can lead you to do things you don’t really want to in order to be able to afford the drug and continue using it. As a result, some people end up damaging their relationships with family members and friends.
Drugs that make you unconscious or unable to move can leave you vulnerable to sexual assault or other safety risks. Steady use of drugs like phencyclidine and ketamine can cause chemical changes in the brain. You can experience: confusion, delirium, hallucinations, paranoia, depression and withdrawal from loved ones, aggression, schizophrenia-like behavior, and persistent bladder problems (called ulcerative cystitis). Further research is needed to determine if these effects can become permanent.
Using ketamine or phencyclidine is a problem when it negatively affects your life or the lives of others. Many of us may think this refers only to people who regularly use large amounts, but even a single occasion of use can lead to a problem. For instance, we may make a poor decision that results in problems with relationships or the law. What’s important to recognize is the potential for adverse consequences of use in any context and over time.
The reasons people use drugs influence their risk of developing problems. For instance, if you use a drug out of curiosity, only occasional or experimental use may follow. But when you use a drug to cope with a long-term problem such as social anxiety, then more long lasting and intense use may follow.
Many people choose not to use phencyclidine or ketamine or to use these drugs in moderation, because being less in control of their body and behaviour increases the likelihood of accidents or making unwise choices such as having unsafe sex. Using the drugs may help you feel more outgoing at a party, but repeatedly using such substances to address social anxiety may lead to harms to your health or relationships.
Acknowledgments
[2014] This fact sheet was produced by the
Centre for
Addictions Research of BC
on behalf of the BC Partners for Mental Health and Addictions Information. An excerpt
has been reproduced here with permission. To read the full fact sheet and for more
helpful substance use and mental health resources, please visit
www.heretohelp.bc.ca