Psychedelic medicine may help people manage their type-2 diabetes and could help ward off obesity, according to a specialty psychedelic pharmaceutical company. PharmaTher Holdings Ltd., announced this week that it had filed a provisional patent application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for the novel use of the dissociative anesthetic ketamine as a potential treatment for obesity and type 2 diabetes, a condition that affects nearly 463 million people.
The company believes ketamine could be an effective treatment for the two related metabolic conditions based on an evaluation of the company’s drug repurposing artificial intelligence platform panaceAI. The company’s patent application identifies protein bindings and interactions with ketamine that suggest the psychedelic anesthetic could treat type 2 diabetes and obesity.
PharmaTher is also using the panaceAI platform to evaluate repurposing opportunities with other psychedelic medicines including DMT, MDMA and LSD, and has also submitted an Investigation New Drug application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to begin a Phase 2 clinical trial to evaluate ketamine for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease.
“We continue to focus on building our patent and product portfolio of prescription-based psychedelics through our drug repurposing and delivery methods for unmet medical needs,” said Fabio Chianelli, CEO of PharmaTher. “We aim to find new uses of psychedelics, such as ketamine, psilocybin, DMT, MDMA and LSD, and incorporate them into our proprietary microneedle patch delivery system. We are well-positioned to unlock value in our patent portfolio consisting of novel uses, formulations and delivery systems for psychedelics as a pharmaceutical prescription.”
