Psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT) is an emerging treatment approach that often combines pharmacotherapeutic dosing sessions with more traditional psychotherapy. Despite limited formal regulatory approval, treatment seekers can currently access PAT through a variety of avenues, including ketamine treatment centers and “supported adult use” psilocybin centers...
Psilocybin, a naturally occurring psychedelic compound found in certain fungi, has long been used by Indigenous cultures worldwide for healing and spiritual purposes. While emerging evidence points to psychedelic agents being novel avenues for the treatment of substance use disorders, the predominantly Western medical models of psychedelic-assisted therapy b...
Background: Preliminary evidence suggests psilocybin may have therapeutic value for various mental health conditions; despite this, it is currently illegal in the UK. Less is known about how people form their attitudes towards psilocybin policies. Objectives: To explore whether beliefs about the benefits and safety of psilocybin influence support for psilocy...
Fibromyalgia (FM) is the prototypical nociplastic pain condition, characterized by widespread pain and issues with cognition, mood, and sleep. Currently, there are limited treatment options available that effectively treat FM symptoms. Psilocybin-assisted therapy (PAT) is an emerging combined drug-therapy intervention, but no studies to-date have investigate...
Emerging legal frameworks in Oregon and Colorado license facilitators to support adults receiving psychedelic services. The current legal frameworks are silent regarding facilitators’ personal experience with psychedelics. An e Delphi process recruited 36 experts with at least 5 years’ experience facilitating psilocybin experiences in ceremonial settings, in...
Background: Classic psychedelics such as psilocybin and LSD are anecdotally associated with the phenomenon of "psychedelic afterglow," a set of predominantly pleasant, temporary psychological effects reported after the acute effects have subsided. Since post-acute effects are crucial for the therapeutic use of psychedelics, an instrument to systematically as...
This study is an open-label, single-arm, proof-of-concept study, wherein treatment resistant bipolar depression (TRBD) participants will receive one 25 mg dose of oral psilocybin accompanied by preparatory, monitoring, and integration psychotherapy sessions (psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy, or PAP). Using fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging), the f...
Objective: The aesthetic qualities of psychedelic experiences have long been documented, but their specific contribution to therapeutic outcomes remains unexplored. This study investigates the role of psychedelic-induced aesthetic experiences in predicting positive psychological outcomes. Methods: Using a cross-sectional naturalistic survey, participants who...
Introduction There has been a surge in research into psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy over the past decade, with many studies indicating this may be an effective novel intervention for several mental health disorders. Researchers are increasingly incorporating qualitative analysis into their studies in recognition of the rich, contextual information this pr...
The recent review of a new drug application for MDMA-assisted therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder by the United States’ Food and Drug Administration (FDA) highlighted epistemological and methodological challenges for evidence assessments. Similar challenges will also be faced in reviews of other compounds in early- and late-stage development, like psi...
Background Recent studies have intensively explored the potential antidepressant effects of psilocybin. However, important variables such as previous experience, repeated administration, setting and sex remain underexplored. This study describes the acute psilocybin experience and long-term effects in a small sample of healthy individuals. Methods In a doubl...
BACKGROUND: Psychedelic substances reliably induce marked altered states of consciousness (ASC), which may be important for lasting effects and clinical outcomes of psychedelic intervention. Several instruments are available to measure the acute psychedelic experience, of which the Five Dimensional Altered States of Consciousness Questionnaire (5D-ASC) is co...
Background: How the human psyche interacts with the theme of death is fundamental to individual and societal life, profoundly influencing cognition, affect, and behavior. Death-related psychological phenomena, such as death anxiety and acceptance, have been shown in clinical studies to be influenced by psychedelic (LSD and psilocybin) interventions. However,...
Ketamine is classified as a dissociative anaesthetic that, in sub-anaesthetic doses, can produce an altered state of consciousness characterised by dissociative symptoms, visual and auditory hallucinations, and perceptual distortions. Given the anaesthetic-like and psychedelic-like nature of this compound, it is expected to have different effects on brain dy...
Introduction: Treatment-outcome expectancies are an individual’s beliefs about how a medical or psychological intervention will affect them and others. These response expectancies represent serious potential confounds to clinical trials of psychedelic-assisted therapies for a variety of conditions because of difficulties associated with blinding psychedelic ...
5-MeO-DMT is a psychedelic substance with a short duration of action and intensive effects. Its therapeutic efficacy and practicality may significantly surpass those of classical psychedelics such as ayahuasca and LSD. This retrospective ethnographic inquiry features a woman in her mid-thirties who witnessed her mother's violent suicide and its bloody afterm...
Introduction: Studies of psychedelic-assisted therapy with LSD, psilocybin, MDMA, and related substances show clinical promise but inadequately assess side effects. Measuring side effects is challenging because they are not always easily differentiated from treatment effects or disease symptoms and show high heterogeneity, variable duration and impact, and s...
Psychedelics (hallucinogenic 5-HT2A agonists such as psilocybin) are gaining recognition for their potential to treat a range of conditions, including anxiety-related psychopathology. Despite early promising results, the mechanisms by which psychedelic therapy alleviates anxiety are not well understood. Here, we review neural and cognitive mechanisms underly...
