Ketamine and Psychedelic Therapy in San Francisco

How to Find Ketamine Care and a Psychedelic Therapist in San Francisco

There are two practical ways to start ketamine therapy in San Francisco. The first is at-home ketamine therapy delivered by telehealth: a licensed clinician evaluates you online, and if it is a good fit, medication is shipped to you and your sessions are supported remotely. This option is available to eligible adults across the city and the wider Bay Area. The second is an in-clinic ketamine provider, where you receive IV infusions or IM injections in a medical office with on-site monitoring.

For in-clinic care, San Francisco has several full-modality options. San Francisco Preventive Medical Group in West Portal offers IV ketamine and publishes its package pricing, and Pacific Mind Health in the Financial District offers IV ketamine, IM ketamine, and Spravato.¹² ¹³ Other multi-modality clinics operate in the Castro and around Union Square. Most people searching for a psychedelic therapist in San Francisco are looking for psilocybin, MDMA, or a guided psychedelic experience, but none of those are legally available for therapy in California. The psychedelic-class therapy you can legally begin in San Francisco today is ketamine, offered either in a local clinic or at home after a clinician confirms you are a good fit. You can learn more in the psychedelic therapy guide.

Where Ketamine and Psychedelic Therapy Is Available Across San Francisco

San Francisco is compact, and its ketamine and psychedelic-therapy providers cluster in a handful of areas: Union Square and the Financial District downtown, West Portal on the west side, and the Castro. In-clinic care is concentrated in those neighborhoods, so people in the Sunset, the Richmond, the Mission, Nob Hill, or SoMa often travel downtown for an appointment.

At-home care removes that travel entirely. Because it is delivered by telehealth, at-home ketamine therapy in California reaches every San Francisco neighborhood the same way, whether you live near Ocean Beach or in the East Bay commute corridor, with no clinic visit required. For eligible adults, that makes ketamine therapy near you in San Francisco a question of scheduling rather than geography.

Your Ketamine and Psychedelic Therapy Options in San Francisco

Here is how the main paths compare, without ranking them. Prices are per session unless noted, and in-clinic figures reflect San Francisco's higher-cost market.

The biggest split is at-home versus in-clinic. In-clinic IV or IM ketamine gives you a supervised, in-office experience and runs about $600 or more per session in the Bay Area per HealingMaps, with San Francisco Preventive Medical Group publishing set packages of $1,700 (one infusion plus two therapy sessions), $3,000, and $4,600.¹² ¹³ At-home ketamine therapy is $165 to $215 per session within a multi-session program, done from home with preparation and integration support. Spravato, an FDA-approved esketamine nasal spray, is offered at certified San Francisco offices including Mindful Health Solutions in Union Square and Numa Psychiatry on Bush Street; it may be covered by insurance for people who qualify, subject to the insurer's prior authorization, and is otherwise paid out of pocket.¹⁴

The two psychedelic paths on the list are effectively closed in California today. Licensed psilocybin therapy, the kind available through regulated centers in Oregon and Colorado, does not exist here, and MDMA-assisted therapy is not FDA-approved or available anywhere. The other legal route to those investigational compounds is a clinical trial. San Francisco is actually a strong place for that: UCSF's Translational Psychedelic Research Program runs active psilocybin trials, including one for depression in Parkinson's disease, though slots are limited and never guaranteed.¹⁵ For people who want a psychedelic-class therapy they can reliably start now, ketamine is the option that is legal and available.

The Conditions Ketamine Therapy Is Used For

Depression is the flagship indication and the most studied, including ketamine treatment for depression that has not responded to other medications. Because it works through a different mechanism than daily antidepressants, ketamine can help many people who have cycled through several options without relief.

Ketamine therapy is also used for anxiety, PTSD, grief, burnout, and sleep, each reflected in the outcomes below. Interest in MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD is common, but since MDMA is not FDA-approved or available, ketamine is the accessible, evidence-backed path today, and it is the only at-home ketamine therapy with peer-reviewed PTSD outcomes.¹

Mindbloom's Psychedelic Therapy Programs and Outcomes

For people who choose to do ketamine therapy from home, the reasons are usually privacy, flexible scheduling, and cost, backed by a growing evidence base. Mindbloom has delivered more than 800,000 guided at-home sessions and is one of the largest at-home psychedelic-therapy providers. Its outcomes draw on a peer-reviewed subcutaneous study (Parks 2026) covering depression, anxiety, and PTSD in one study, alongside two earlier peer-reviewed sublingual studies (Hull 2022, Mathai 2024) and research preprints extending to grief, burnout, and sleep, the largest published evidence base in at-home ketamine therapy.¹ ²

_{Table notes. ¹ Subcutaneous, six-session course (Parks 2026). Response = at least 50% reduction (PHQ-9/GAD-7) or at least 10 points (PCL-5); remission = final PHQ-9/GAD-7 under 5, or at least a 10-point reduction with PCL-5 under 33. ⁵ Grief (Swain, PGD-13). ⁶ Burnout (Swain, MBI-GS). ⁷ Sleep (Swain, PHQ-9 Item 3); single-item measure, and ketamine is off-label for sleep. ᵃ Grief remission = no longer met diagnostic criteria (71.1%). ᵇ Burnout response = improved on at least one dimension (69.6%); remission = fell below the burnout threshold (59.5%). ᶜ Sleep remission = complete resolution. Individual results vary.}

Mindbloom offers tailored psychedelic-therapy programs, built with mental-health thought leaders, that use the psychedelic modality to address specific outcomes rather than only prescribing medication for them. Programs include Grief, Habit Change, Anxiety, Depression, Self-Love, and Burnout.

A few study-vs-study comparisons put those numbers in context:

• Mindbloom's reported depression response is comparable to the rate reported in a study of first-line SSRIs, without a daily medication and faster (2 sessions vs four to six weeks).¹ ³
• Mindbloom's reported anxiety response rate is about 29% higher than the rate reported in a study of CBT for generalized anxiety (60.6% vs 47%), in about half the time.¹ ⁴
• Mindbloom's reported anxiety response is comparable to the rate reported in a study of first-line SSRIs, without a daily pill.¹ ³
• Mindbloom's reported depression response (56.6%) is at or above the rate reported in the largest controlled trials of single-dose psilocybin for depression (about 37–42%), on a far larger published evidence base and delivered at home rather than in a full-day, in-person licensed-center session.¹ ⁸

Across both routes, serious adverse events occurred in fewer than 0.1% of participants.¹ ²

Is Ketamine Legal in California? Is Psychedelic Therapy Legal in San Francisco?

Ketamine is legal in California and across all 50 states. It is an FDA-approved, Schedule III medication that a licensed clinician can prescribe off-label for mental health, which is why it is available now, both in San Francisco clinics and at home via telehealth for eligible adults.

Psilocybin and MDMA are different. Both are Schedule I under California law, and unlike Oregon or Colorado, California has no licensed psychedelic-therapy program.¹⁰ San Francisco does carry a local wrinkle worth understanding: on September 6, 2022 the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution supporting entheogenic plant practices, urging the lowest-priority enforcement for psilocybin and similar plants. That resolution is symbolic. It does not legalize psilocybin or create any legal way to receive it as therapy, and several other California cities have passed similar measures.¹¹ In practical terms, that means ketamine remains the psychedelic-class therapy you can legally begin in San Francisco today, with clinical trials such as those at UCSF the other legal route to investigational psychedelics.¹⁵

How At-Home Ketamine Therapy Works

Ketamine works differently from a daily antidepressant. It acts on the brain's NMDA receptors and stimulates neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to form new connections, which can lift mood quickly and, over a course of sessions, help those gains hold. Many people notice an early shift, with cumulative benefit building across the program rather than from any single session.

The at-home model starts with an online clinical evaluation. A licensed clinician reviews your history and decides whether ketamine therapy is a good fit and, if so, prescribes it with a personalized, clinician-guided schedule rather than a fixed cadence. Sessions happen at home with preparation and integration support, and your progress is monitored throughout. If you already work with a therapist or prescriber, that care can continue alongside the program.

Cost, Insurance, and Getting Started

The Bay Area is one of the higher-priced ketamine markets in the country, roughly 20 to 30% above the national median per HealingMaps.¹³ In-clinic ketamine here runs about $600 or more per session, and San Francisco Preventive Medical Group publishes multi-session packages of $1,700 to $4,600.¹² Spravato may be covered by insurance for people who qualify, subject to prior authorization. At-home ketamine therapy with Mindbloom is $165 to $215 per session within a multi-session program of 6, 12, or 18 sessions, is HSA and FSA eligible, and may qualify for out-of-network reimbursement. Current pricing and program details are listed by session count.

Whichever path fits, ketamine therapy is a prescription medical treatment, not a retail product. Eligibility begins with an online clinician evaluation, and a licensed clinician confirms it is a good fit before treatment starts. You can read more in the Mindbloom overview or begin an eligibility evaluation online.