Bec Oakes
With Matthew Perry's cause of death confirmed to be the effects of ketamine, here's everything you need to know about the hallucinogen.
Matthew Perry was a beloved actor, best known for his role as Chandler Bing in the iconic 90s sitcom, Friends.
The world was left in shock when Perry was found dead in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home on 28 October this year, aged just 54.
An autopsy reported, obtained by People on Friday, (December 15) determined the actor's cause of death.
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The 'acute effects of ketamine' were listed as a cause of death by the medical examiner.
Other contributing factors reported in the 54-year-old's death include drowning, coronary artery disease, and the opioid buprenorphine.
According to the US Drug Enforcement Administration, ketamine is a 'dissociative anaesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects.'
The drug 'can induce a state of sedation (feeling calm and relaxed), immobility, relief from pain, and amnesia,' and also 'distorts the perception of sight and sound and makes the user feel disconnected and not in control.'
Ketamine was approved as a short-acting anaesthetic by the US Food and Drug Administration in the 1970s and can also be used in low doses in order to manage a range of mental health conditions, including anxiety, depression and PTSD.
Perry had been practicing ketamine infusion therapy prior to his death as a treatment for depression and anxiety. His last treatment took place 'one and a half weeks' before he died.
However, the coroner has noted that 'the ketamine in his system at death could not be from that infusion therapy, since ketamine's half-life is 3 to 4 hours, or less.'
Alongside its medicinal purposes, ketamine is also a popular party drug as it can put people into a relaxed or detached state and make the user feel like they're having an out-of-body experience.
However, it can extremely dangerous, particularly when combined with other drugs, causing amnesia, seizures and dangerously slow breathing.
Perry had previously spoken about the effects of ketamine in his memoir, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing.
He wrote: “Ketamine was a very popular street drug in the 1980s. There is a synthetic form of it now, and it’s used for two reasons: to ease pain and help with depression."
He went on to describe how the drug had made him 'disassociate' and feel as though he was 'dying,' adding: "[it] was not for me."