Curcumin vs Ketamine for mood
Short answer: For mood, users rate them about the same: 96% report improvement with Curcumin (45 reports) and 97% with Ketamine (62 reports).
Curcumin has 538 meta-analyses and 553 randomized trials on PubMed; Ketamine has 854 and 1,957.
Based on 544 reports about Curcumin and 141 about Ketamine. Not medical advice.
| Curcumin Supplement | Ketamine Medication | |
|---|---|---|
| Users say it helped | 61%helped180 reports · high confidence | 65%helped65 reports · medium confidence |
| Verdict | Mostly positive | Mostly positive |
| Research | AResearch: Strong | AResearch: Strong |
| Meta-analyses / RCTs | 538 / 553 | 854 / 1,957 |
| Mainly used for | ||
| Mood % reporting improvement | 96% (45) | 97% (62) |
| Pain & inflammation % reporting improvement | 91% (104) | — |
| Anxiety % reporting improvement | 93% (15) | 90% (10) |
| Memory % reporting improvement | 100% (12) | 50% (2) |
| Focus % reporting improvement | 78% (9) | 100% (3) |
| Common side effects | vivid dreams, headache, nausea, dht suppression | dissociation, headache, fatigue, insomnia |
| Typical dose reported | 1000 mg / daily | Not listed |
Curcumin and Curcuma longa Extract may improve symptoms and inflammation levels in people with arthritis. However, due to the low quality and small quantity of RCTs, the conclusions need to be interpreted carefully.
Front Immunol, 2022 ↗“I recently stopped taking Curcumin because of its affect on DHT and I was looking for an alternative measure to deal with inflammation as I feel it really helped with anxiety/depression.”
Compared with etomidate, ketamine probably results in more hemodynamic instability during the peri-intubation period and appears to have no effect on successful intubation on the first attempt or mortality. However, ketamine results in decreased need for the initiation of vasopressor use and decreases adrenal suppression compared with etomidate.
Crit Care Med, 2025 ↗“One thing that has really helped me tremendously, without the nasty side effects of SSRIs, is Ketamine infusions.”
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Percentages come from first-hand user reports and are not clinical outcomes. Talk to a doctor before starting, stopping or combining anything. How we rate