This study was designed to examine the rapid antidepressant effects of single dose ketamine on suicidal ideation and overall depression level in patients with newly-diagnosed cancer. Forty-two patients were enrolled into the controlled trial and randomized into two groups: ketamine group and midazolam group. Patients from the two groups received a sub-anesthetic dose of racemic ketamine hydrochloride or midazolam. Suicidal ideation score, measured with the Beck Scale and suicidal part of the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale, significantly decreased on day 1 and day 3 in ketamine-treated patients when compared to those treated with midazolam. Consistently, overall depression levels measured using the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale indicated a significant relief of overall depression on day 1 in ketamine-treated patients. Collectively, this study provides novel information about the rapid antidepressant effect of ketamine on acute depression and suicidal ideation in newly-diagnosed cancer patients.

Latent transforming growth factor β binding protein 2 (LTBP2) involved in the TGF pathway to induce immunosuppression and immune response. However, the association between the outcome of patients, the infiltrating immune cell and LTBP2 expression is still unclear in human cancers. The LTBP2 expression was analyzed by TIIMER and Oncomine database. Based on the Prognoscan database, the GEPIA database, and the Kaplan-Meier plotter database, the prognostic value was assessed. The immune and stromal score of tumors was calculated through ESTIMATE. We additionally explore the relationship among the LTBP2 expression, the infiltrating immune cells, and its gene markers in the TIMER, TISIDB, and GEPIA database, the enriched KEGG pathways of LTBP2 were evaluated by GSEA. The result showed that LTBP2 expressed differently among the normal and tumor tissues in various sorts of cancer involving stomach adenocarcinoma (STAD) and colon adenocarcinoma (COAD), and three cohorts of COAD presented that the LTBP2 high expression was linked with poorer disease-free survival and the elevated LTBP2 expression correlated with progression-free survival and poorer overall survival in STAD. The LTBP2 was correlated with the stromal and immune score in different cancers. The infiltrating immune cells include the CD8+T cells and CD4+T cells, macrophages, neutrophils, and dendritic cells were correlated with the LTBP2 expression. Meanwhile, LTBP2 was related to the infiltrating immune cell’s gene markers and enriched immune-related pathways in STAD and COAD. LTBP2 was the potential to be an independent predictor for the prognosis and a new target for immunotherapy in STAD and COAD.