Why MDMA-assisted psychotherapy may become an FDA-approved treatment for PTSD within 2 years

For peo­ple with post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der, recall­ing mem­o­ries of phys­i­cal or sex­u­al assault, com­bat or dis­­as­ter-relat­ed events can induce intense anx­i­ety or pan­ic attacks as well as debil­i­tat­ing flash­backs. In the U.S., about 7% of peo­ple suf­fer from PTSD and lose an aver­age of about four work­ing days each month as a result. Trau­­ma-spe­­cif­ic psychotherapy,…

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Study finds MDMA-assisted therapy to be safe and highly effective to treat severe PTSD

The First Phase 3 Suc­cess for Psy­che­delics Will Pave the Way for an Indus­try (Bar­ron’s): Post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der is a crip­pling, hard-to-treat psy­chi­atric afflic­tion. Amer­i­ca spends bil­lions of dol­lars year­ly just on the vet­er­ans who suf­fer from PTSD. So it’s heart­en­ing to see the report of a promis­ing new treat­ment, pub­lished Mon­day in Nature Medicine.

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Next: Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy?

How ecsta­sy and psilo­cy­bin are shak­ing up psy­chi­a­try (Nature): … The Impe­r­i­al study was one of a spate of clin­i­cal tri­als launched over the past few years using illic­it psy­che­del­ic drugs such as psilo­cy­bin, lyser­gic acid diethy­lamide (LSD) and MDMA (3,4‑methylenedioxymethamphetamine, also known as mol­ly or ecsta­sy) to treat men­­tal-health dis­or­ders, gen­er­al­ly with the close…

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Study: Psychedelics can promote neural plasticity in the prefrontal cortex and expand pathways for mental health

Psy­che­delics in Neu­rol­o­gy: Poten­tial for Improv­ing Neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty (Neu­rol­o­gy­Times): “Back in the 1950s, research was prov­ing that psy­che­del­ic agents could be effec­tive in the treat­ment of var­i­ous neu­ropsy­chi­atric dis­or­ders. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, just as sci­ence was explor­ing their ben­e­fi­cial effects, the coun­ter­cul­ture was explor­ing and embrac­ing their effects. Slow­ly but sure­ly, psy­che­delics were asso­ci­at­ed with rebel­lious youth and…

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