Context:
Psychedelic drugs are emerging in research as promising ways to treat treatment resistant depression and post traumatic stress disorder.
About Psychedelic Substances:
- Psychedelics are a group of drugs that alter perception, mood, and thought processing while a person is still clearly conscious.
- Usually, the person’s insight also remains unimpaired after intake of Psychedelic substances.
- They are non addictive, nontoxic and compared to illicit drugs, they are less harmful to the end user.
- In India, the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act 1985 prohibits the use of psychedelic substances.
How do Drugs work in the body?
- Users of psychedelic substances report changes in perception, somatic experience, mood, thought processing, and entheogenic experiences.
- Perceptual distortions most commonly include the visual domain.
- An intriguing phenomenon called synaesthesia may occur, where the sensory modalities cross and the user may ‘hear colour’ or ‘see sounds’. .
- Classical psychedelics boost brain serotonin levels.
Can such substances cause harm?
- Death due to direct toxicity of LSD, psilocybin or mescaline has not been reported despite 50 plus years of recreational use.
- Synthetic psychedelics (such as 25INBOMe) have been associated with acute cardiac, central nervous system, and limb ischaemia, as well as serotonin syndrome. There have also been reports of death attributed directly to synthetic psychedelic use.
- The psychological effects of psychedelics depend on the interaction between the drug and the user’s mindset (together called a set), and the environmental setting.
- There is also no evidence that psychedelics cause physiological or psychological dependence — nor has any withdrawal syndrome been identified.
- Tension headaches are common in the 24 hours after use and are offset by the use of simple analgesics.
Can psychedelics be used to treat neuropsychiatric disorders?
- In 2017, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) designated the use of methylenedioxymethamphetamine, also known as MDMA, to be the “breakthrough therapy” in the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
- U.S. non profit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) also announced positive results from its observational study on MDMA assisted therapy for patients with PTSD.
- In 2018, the FDA had granted “breakthrough therapy” status to psilocybin for treatment resistant depression as well.
Conclusion:
- While not a panacea, psychedelic substances have certainly reinvigorated clinical and research interests. If larger phase III trials establish their safety and therapeutic efficacy, the FDA and other regulatory bodies may clear these agents for routine clinical use.
News Source: The Hindu
2 May 2023
