Natural Psychedelics May Be The Best Therapy For Depression

With up to half of patients who use prescription drugs to manage depression experiencing severe, often debilitating symptoms, experts are looking into alternative ways to treat the disorder, Brian O. Dunleavy reported for United Press International (UPI).

Photo Insert: Recently, the spotlight has been on "recreational" psychedelic drugs like psilocybin, the euphoric ingredient found in magic mushrooms.

Finding safe, effective antidepressants is a high priority in the pharmaceutical business because they are routinely prescribed pharmaceuticals in the United States; according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), up to one in ten people take them on a regular basis.

Recently, the spotlight has been on "recreational" psychedelic drugs like psilocybin, the euphoric ingredient found in magic mushrooms. "There are now many clinical trials to test psychedelics for many disorders, including depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, substance use disorder, and cluster headache," said psychiatrist Alex Kwan in an email to UPI.

According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research, psilocybin is a naturally occurring psychedelic that was found in the late 1950s in mushrooms picked from Central America.

It has been used for centuries as a tool of spiritual exploration, but it may work similarly to antidepressant medicines in depression by acting on serotonin, a brain chemical essential to a person's mood.

A study published in Nature Medicine in April discovered that psilocybin reduced depression symptoms in adults. According to the Hopkins Center, ibogaine is another hallucinogenic found in plants in Africa and elsewhere.

For centuries, the hallucinogen known as "toad" or "venom" has been utilized in religious rites, but it may also be an effective treatment for mental health disorders. It is thought to help manage depression symptoms by acting on key brain messengers that regulate mood. Ibogaine has been associated with major adverse effects like erratic heartbeat, which could limit its use.

Dimethyltryptamine, a fundamental element in ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic beverage used for centuries in Indigenous communities in South America, is another psychedelic that may benefit persons with severe depression.

The chemical was proven to lessen depressive symptoms in a short research with six individuals published in 2015. According to the Hopkins Center, dimethyltryptamine, ibogaine, and psilocybin are naturally occurring compounds, whereas tests of synthetic psychedelics such as LSD have not yielded the same results.

As a result, experts like Kwan strongly advise against using their recreational forms to "self-medicate" if you have depression, especially since they have yet to be approved for treatment, because higher doses "can exacerbate symptoms in people prone to psychosis" and there may be other safety concerns.

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