Psychedelics and Psychiatry

[The Hammer]

How ecstasy and psilocybin are shaking up psychiatry

An article discussing recent scientific advances in the usage of psychedelics as a form of treatment for treatment resistant depression, ptsd, and other neurologic conditions.

Larger clinical trials still need to be investigated, but, welcome back 60's we missed you.

 

[sun rise]

The 60's were about not careful use of those drugs to cure illness but experimentation and sensation seeking. There were casualties from that era caused by drugs (and still are).

I have zero issue with their use to treat illness when prescribed by a physician.

 

[The Hammer]

The 60's were about not careful use of those drugs to cure illness but experimentation and sensation seeking. There were casualties from that era caused by drugs (and still are).

I have zero issue with their use to treat illness when prescribed by a physician.

From the article: . In the 1950s and 1960s, scientists published more than 1,000 articles on using psychedelics as a psychiatric treatment; the drugs were tested on around 40,000 people in total. Then, as recreational use of the drugs spread, they were banned and the FDA constricted supplies for research.

Edit: but I agree care needs to be taken with prescribing these. It's not a miracle cure.

 

[sun rise]

From the article: . In the 1950s and 1960s, scientists published more than 1,000 articles on using psychedelics as a psychiatric treatment; the drugs were tested on around 40,000 people in total. Then, as recreational use of the drugs spread, they were banned and the FDA constricted supplies for research.

Edit: but I agree care needs to be taken with prescribing these. It's not a miracle cure.

I was commenting on

welcome back 60's we missed you.

You're post of the reason research was stopped supported my comment. I want to see research continue.

 

[Orbit]

I was acquainted with Rick Doblin from MAPS in the 90s. It's good to see they have made so much progress with medical research.

 

[icehorse]

Thanks for the link, nice article!

Hey kids, one important idea here is to be suspicious of anyone who tells you that all illegal drugs are equally dangerous. For the most part (except for Ecstasy), the more natural psychedelics have extremely high "pharmaceutical ratios", that being the ratio between the effective dose and the lethal dose. So, for example, the lowly aspirin tablet can kill you if you take 100 of them- yikes!!! So that's a ratio of 50 (2 are effective : 100 are lethal). So some drugs like meth and speed really ARE dangerous, but the pharmaceutical ratios for marijuana, LSD, shrooms, and most other psychedelics are quite high, like 100,000. Which again would mean if 1 thingie makes you high, it would take 100,000 thingies to kill you.

none of this is to promote drug use, but it IS important to be able to make distinctions.

For example, given the above data, does it really make sense to make marijuana offenses as heavily penalized as meth offenses?

 

[The Hammer]

I was commenting on



You're post of the reason research was stopped supported my comment. I want to see research continue.

I wasn't advocating recreational usage, just medical research as was conducted in the 50's and 60's. So welcome back .

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

How ecstasy and psilocybin are shaking up psychiatry

An article discussing recent scientific advances in the usage of psychedelics as a form of treatment for treatment resistant depression, ptsd, and other neurologic conditions.

Larger clinical trials still need to be investigated, but, welcome back 60's we missed you.

Psychedelics are more helpful than useless Big Pharma antidepressants, honestly. Antidepressants are addictive (they rewire your brain chemistry and the brain freaks out when the levels drop) and cause terrible withdrawal.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

The 60's were about not careful use of those drugs to cure illness but experimentation and sensation seeking. There were casualties from that era caused by drugs (and still are).

I have zero issue with their use to treat illness when prescribed by a physician.

Doctors are often not any more knowledgeable than street dealers. It's just that doctors are legal drug dealers and we're raised to trust them. They'll freely admit that they have no idea how antidepressants even work.

Doctors are also often corrupt and receive various perks from pharmaceutical corps for prescribing their drugs.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

I have zero issue with their use to treat illness when prescribed by a physician.

This isn't about the illegal substances, but I have questions on the general patenting process of anything. So when a physician or researcher goes to make something available to the public, is it true that they have to synthesize and copyright single molecules? So that's why for example, they can't legally say that the sleepytime tea, that anyone can buy at the store, does anything, so they just keep it as a herbal supplement, right ? Do they even say that coffee for example, technically does anything? Since natural things are composed of a complicated system of interacting compounds, does it then cost too much to run them through the FDA? How does that work

 

[The Hammer]

This isn't about the illegal substances, but I have questions on the general patenting process of anything. So when a physician or researcher goes to make something available to the public, is it true that they have to synthesize and copyright single molecules? So that's why for example, they can't legally say that the sleepytime tea at the store does anything, and I guess they just keep it as a herbal supplement, right ? Cause it would cost billions or something to run it through the FDA I guess, and it probably involves a compound system of molecules

This is a fairly accurate assessment I think.

 

[Audie]

The 60's were about not careful use of those drugs to cure illness but experimentation and sensation seeking. There were casualties from that era caused by drugs (and still are).

I have zero issue with their use to treat illness when prescribed by a physician.

I dont think I would have made a good hippie.

 

[The Hammer]

Psychedelics are more helpful than useless Big Pharma antidepressants, honestly. Antidepressants are addictive (they rewire your brain chemistry and the brain freaks out when the levels drop) and cause terrible withdrawal.

This is why you taper psych meds, so you don't withdrawal. All drugs have a withdrawal effect.

 

[Gargovic Malkav]

All this talk about experimentation with psychedelics reminds of some interesting and sometimes funny footage I saw on youtube.
Here's a video of some British troops on acid while training.

 

[Heyo]

I wasn't advocating recreational usage,

Well, then let me do that.

just medical research as was conducted in the 50's and 60's. So welcome back .

In the early 60s several people advocated recreational use of psychedelics, Timothy Leary being probably the best known. But he didn't promote careless use or use to get sedated. He wanted a "drivers permit" for drugs so that the users know what they are doing. He wanted people to be able to explore different states of consciousness. (Yep, he also was into New Age woo and it is sometimes difficult to decide if his ideas were interesting or simply crazy.)

 

[Mock Turtle]

All this talk about experimentation with psychedelics reminds of some interesting and sometimes funny footage I saw on youtube.
Here's a video of some British troops on acid while training.

Reminds me of our night exercise when with the Scouts, and on holiday in Cornwall, where one lad almost fell down the face of a quarry - perhaps because our superiors hadn't checked the area sufficiently to pinpoint all the dangers.

 

[Polymath257]

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[stvdv]

An article discussing recent scientific advances in the usage of psychedelics as a form of treatment for treatment resistant depression, ptsd, and other neurologic conditions.

Larger clinical trials still need to be investigated, but, welcome back 60's we missed you.

Interesting to see, that science finally catches up with the wisdom known already a few millennia ago in India (Patanjali)

They warned against the practices described in this article though. So, I rather stick to the wisdom of the Sages

 

[ChristineM]

I dont think I would have made a good hippie.

I am sure you would. They were not all potheads and lsd junkies. In fact the world of the 70s on has been much influence by former hippies

 

[Audie]

I am sure you would. They were not all potheads and lsd junkies. In fact the world of the 70s on has been much influence by former hippies

From what I read there was next to nothing
that my values and behaviour are not as near
opposite as you can get.