By Maia Szalavitz — 2012
A new brain-scan study helps explain how psilocybin works—and why it holds promise as a treatment for depression, addiction and post-traumatic stress.
Read on healthland.time.com
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In the last two decades, researchers have started to reexamine psychedelics for their therapeutic potential. Though initial results seem promising, the research has a significant shortcoming: the lack of racial and ethnic diversity among research teams and study participants.
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A new study finds widespread exclusion of minorities in psychedelic research.
We’re seeing an explosion of medical research into psychedelics. Psilocybin, or shrooms, to treat major depressive disorder. Ayahuasca, a psychotropic plant medicine from the Amazon, and ibogaine, a potent hallucinogen from Africa, to treat addiction. LSD for anxiety.
Through this treatment plan, the patient was able to “reconceptualize her trauma” and “was able to move through difficult memories and emotions rather than letting them consume her,” explained U of O associate professor, Monnica Williams.
These substances are being touted as a game-changing intervention for mental health. But it’s not clear if their promise will be accessible to all.
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The exuberant “renaissance” of studies researching psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy in the past twenty years has not sufficiently included the enrollment of racially diverse participants, a problem that psychedelic science and clinical research shares with mainstream psychiatry
In an important step toward medical approval, MDMA, the illegal drug popularly known as Ecstasy or Molly, was shown to bring relief to those suffering from severe post-traumatic stress disorder when paired with talk therapy.
Repeated intravenous (IV) ketamine infusions significantly reduce symptom severity in individuals with chronic post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and the improvement is rapid and maintained for several weeks afterwards, according to a new study.
Research over the last decade has shown MDMA-assisted psychotherapy to be effective in treating PTSD from military combat, sexual assault and childhood abuse. Now researchers are trialing MDMA with couples and finding promising results.
Scott Atkinson says magic mushrooms have already done much to tame the post-traumatic stress demons conjured by two years serving in Afghanistan and Bosnia.