Importance: Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a substantial public health burden, but current treatments have limited effectiveness and adherence. Recent evidence suggests that 1 or 2 administrations of psilocybin with psychological support produces antidepressant effects in patients with cancer and in those with treatment-resistant depression. Objective: T...
The concept of self and self-referential processing has a growing explanatory value in psychiatry and neuroscience, referring to the cognitive organization and perceptual differentiation of self-stimuli in health and disease. Conditions in which selfhood loses its natural coherence offer a unique opportunity for elucidating the mechanisms underlying self-dis...
The medium- to long-term consequences of COVID-19 are not yet known, though an increase in mental health problems are predicted. Multidisciplinary strategies across socio-economic and psychological levels may be needed to mitigate the mental health burden of COVID-19. Preliminary evidence from the rapidly progressing field of psychedelic science shows that p...
Introduction Psilocybin (PSI) has persistent antidepressant efficacy in human trials. We have shown one dose of PSI to significantly decrease depressive-like behavior in male Wistar-Kyoto (WKY) rats for at least five weeks without losing efficacy. However, the outcome assay we used to evaluate depressive-like behavior, the forced swim test (FST), has been cr...
cancer patient: cancer patientWith the technological advances that have been made in diagnostics for cancer, more disease is being detected at an earlier stage. Although this generally improves the patient's chances for survival, a diagnosis of cancer can often provoke significant psychological distress in patients. A significant number of cancer patients wi...
Psilocybin is the psychoactive compound of mushrooms in the psilocybe species. Psilocybin directly affects a number of serotonin receptors, with highest affinity for the serotonin 2A receptor (5HT-2Ar). Generally, the effects of psilocybin, and its active metabolite psilocin, are well established and include a range of cognitive, emotional, and perceptual pe...
Psilocybin is a classic psychedelic compound that may have efficacy for the treatment of mood and substance use disorders. Acute psilocybin effects include reduced negative mood, increased positive mood, and reduced amygdala response to negative affective stimuli. However, no study has investigated the long-term, enduring impact of psilocybin on negative aff...
BACKGROUND: Psilocybin has shown promise as a treatment for depression but its therapeutic mechanisms are not properly understood. In contrast to the presumed actions of antidepressants, we recently found increased amygdala responsiveness to fearful faces one day after open-label treatment with psilocybin (25 mg) in 19 patients with treatment-resistant depre...
As a continual source of sensory input and fundamental component of self-referential processing, the body holds an integral modulatory role in cognition. In a healthy state, predictive coding of multisensory integration promotes the construction of a coherent self. However, several psychiatric disorders comprise aberrant perceptions of the bodily self that a...
BACKGROUND: The repeated use of small doses of psychedelics such as psilocybin and lsd over a period of time (microdosing, md) has gained popularity and scientific attention in recent years. Retrospective reports from users suggest clinical potential. AIM: To answer the question whether md with psychedelics could theoretically provide symptom relief for peop...
Serotoninergic hallucinogens include drugs such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), dimethyltryptamine (DMT) and psilocybin. Recent trials with single/few doses of these compounds show that they induce rapid and sustained antidepressive, anxiolytic, and antiaddictive effects. These effects are also observed in religious groups using the DMT-containing brew ...
Background and aims Given the enormous global burden of depressive illness, there is an urgent need to develop novel and more effective treatments for major depressive disorder (MDD). Recent findings have suggested that psychedelic drugs may have a role in the treatment of depressive symptoms, and a number of groups are in the process of developing protocols...
Parkinson's disease is often characterised by movement symptoms such as rigidity and bradykinesia, however, there are a number of non-motor symptoms that can have a significant impact on quality of life. One of the most common non-motor symptoms of Parkinson's disease is visual hallucinations (where someone sees things that don't exist outside their mind).. ...
BackgroundRecognition of emotions in facial expressions (REFE) is a key aspect of social cognition. Anxiety and mood disorders are associated with deficits in REFE, and anxiolytics and antidepressants reverse these deficits. Recent studies have shown that serotonergic hallucinogens (i.e. ayahuasca, dimethyltryptamine, psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide [...
