‘Magic mushroom’ drug lifts anxiety for cancer patients
Mind-blowing tests remain unexplained
Psychedelic medicine, long taboo, is moving toward the mainstream: Two new studies show the hallucinogenic drug psilocybin might relieve anxiety and depression in cancer patients.
Dozens of distressed patients, treated under controlled conditions at two prestigious medical centers, saw spirit-lifting effects that lasted at least several weeks after taking the “magic mushroom” drug, according to results published Thursday in The Journal of Psychopharmacology.
In an unusual move, the journal also published 10 commentaries from experts in psychiatry, end-of-life care and drug policy. The experts said the studies were small and preliminary but all supported continued research. They suggest psilocybin, while still illegal outside of studies, is “well within the accepted scope of modern psychiatry,” said an editorial by David Nutt, a professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College, London.
But the benefits remain unconfirmed and largely unexplained, commentators said. Just how a hallucinogenic experience might lift anxiety and depression over weeks or months is “the $64,000 question,” said Jeffrey Lieberman, a past president of the American Psychiatric Association and chair of psychiatry at Columbia University. He co-wrote one of the commentaries calling for more studies.
The studies were conducted with 29 patients at New York University Langone Medical Center and 51 patients at Johns Hopkins University. All had advanced cancers and were anxious or depressed.
Patients reported the dreamlike visions and heightened emotions typically produced by psilocybin. In the days and weeks afterward, therapists helped them sort through what many saw as “mystical experiences” of connection and love, research leader Roland Griffiths said.
The reported result: immediate sharp declines in anxiety and depression in patients treated first, when compared with initially untreated patients. Those who got delayed treatment also improved, and up to 80% were less distressed at the end of the studies than at the beginning.
But don’t expect your local hospice to offer hallucinogenic trips anytime soon. Any studies would require federal approval.