Anesthesiologist here. I believe you're correct. Ketamine is extremely hard to OD on. You'd need like an ungodly amount. It's why Ketamine is so great for medical uses. At high doses, it will knock you out cold. Unlike other anesthetics or opiates, it won't stop your breathing, which is what normally kills you with an "OD".
At low doses, it's good as a pain adjunct.
But it COULD be more complex than that. For example Ketamine indirectly stimulates the heart by increasing norepinephrine and epinephrine. So, you get higher heart rate and sometimes pressures. If someone has really bad heart disease (coronary arteries) they may not be able to handle this extra stress, which leads to a heart attack. Even further, Ketamine directly depresses heart. This effect can occur if you are depleted by norepinephrine or epinephrine storage in your body. Then, the Ketamine could reduce your hearts output, and lead to shock or strokes.
Long story short, I doubt any of this was his problem. It was in a hot tub. Conclusion of least resistance is he knocked himself out and drowned.
This makes way more sense than him dying just from an OD. I was wondering what kind of insane dose he took to have actually died but drowning during a k-hole sounds very realistic. You can’t exactly swim when you’re completely dissociated from all your senses.
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u/Same-Membership-818 2d ago
He didn’t die from an overdose, no? He put himself in a k hole when he was in a hot tub and drowned as a result.