VA Launches Psilocybin Trial For Veterans With Treatment-Resistant Depression 58
Longtime Slashdot reader sbinning shares a press release: The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced the launch of a new clinical trial to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of psilocybin to treat major depression in Veterans, including those with concurrent PTSD. The new trial comes after a recent executive order on "Accelerating Medical Treatments for Serious Mental Illness," which aims to increase clinical trial participation and accelerate innovative research models and drug approvals for psychedelic drugs.
[...] The randomized, controlled trial will enroll Veterans diagnosed with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder, with or without concurrent PTSD, and will compare outcomes between two psilocybin dosage levels. The study will also assess participants' levels of depression before and after treatment, tolerability of side effects, and overall patient-reported depression. [...] In addition to this trial, VA is involved in 20 active clinical trials focused on psychedelic therapies for mental health conditions. All VA research -- including research into psychedelics -- is conducted under strict safety protocols and in full compliance with federal guidelines.
[...] The randomized, controlled trial will enroll Veterans diagnosed with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder, with or without concurrent PTSD, and will compare outcomes between two psilocybin dosage levels. The study will also assess participants' levels of depression before and after treatment, tolerability of side effects, and overall patient-reported depression. [...] In addition to this trial, VA is involved in 20 active clinical trials focused on psychedelic therapies for mental health conditions. All VA research -- including research into psychedelics -- is conducted under strict safety protocols and in full compliance with federal guidelines.
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Don't taunt the sock puppet. He has sex with himself all the time. And I mean, literally, all the time.
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I sincerely wish your family member all the best. However, your comment seems to belong on another thread.
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About time too (Score:5, Interesting)
It's clear that these psycho active drugs should have the same status Electro-Convulsive therapy - to be resorted to when nothing else works. The willingness to use ECT but not these chemicals is a prejudice driven mistake.
Re: About time too (Score:4)
Is that your professional option or is your opinion just prejudice driven? Why should they be lost resort?
Fair question (Score:2)
The fact of psycho active drugs destroying people completely - most famously Syd Barret, the first lead singer of Pink Floyd - makes me twitchy about them. But perhaps reserving them to 'last resort' is inappropriate. Thanks for the question.
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Did Syd take a measured dose of a specific, professionally refined and purified chemical? Or are the two situations not comparable?
I said 'twitchy' (Score:2)
i.e. feeling they should be as unavailable for abuse as possible. Yet it's clear there is growing evidence of scenarios where they are effective cures, so the need to make them somewhat available is a lot stronger.
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It's clear that these psycho active drugs should have the same status Electro-Convulsive therapy - to be resorted to when nothing else works. The willingness to use ECT but not these chemicals is a prejudice driven mistake.
Would the nasty side effects of approved drugs used today for depression place them as last resort treatments as well? They have some good ones? In the ads, they call them "Unusual urges" which means that the people they treat become promiscuous, or become gambling addicts. Or oddly enough, eliminating potency, to large eweigfght gain, or Tardive dyskenesia.
The prescribing of actual antipsychotics because the patient doesn't feel 24/7 euphoria, and the side effects above - Yeah, psychedelics will have to
Re: About time too (Score:5, Interesting)
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It's always puzzled me why there is no clear reporting distinction between concussive brain damage, does this even have a label?, and PTSD. The two seem to be lumped together in media reporting.
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One injury is evidently physical, the other is psychological. Is that not distinction enough? Is there really a general failure to make that distinction in media reporting?
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And PTSD falls into which category?
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It's clear that these psycho active drugs should have the same status Electro-Convulsive therapy - to be resorted to when nothing else works.
If they work, then why not use them as the first line of treatment?
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It's clear that these psycho active drugs should have the same status Electro-Convulsive therapy - to be resorted to when nothing else works.
If they work, then why not use them as the first line of treatment?
For something to be a first-line of treatment, it must have:
- high clinical effectiveness;
- strong safety profiles;
- broad accessibility; and
- cost-effectiveness.
If something else works that ticks more of the above boxes than psychoactive drugs, then that takes priority. My guess is that psychoactive drugs fail on the second point, and the jury is still out on the first. Not sure about the last two.
[Thanks Google Gemini.]
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For something to be a first-line of treatment, it must have:
- high clinical effectiveness;
- strong safety profiles;
- broad accessibility; and
- cost-effectiveness.
-Psychoactive drugs are effective at changing minds. The exact effects vary from user to user, but can be largely controlled by the clinician/therapist/shamanic guide. Taken alone or in random circumstances they lead to more random (sometimes bad) results.
-Psychoactive drugs are safe. They will not kill you. They will not cause physical harm. In a controlled clinical situation, the chances of a "bad trip" (emotional harm) are very slim.
-Psychoactive drugs are not broadly accessible only because we choo
Re: About time too (Score:2)
> but can be largely controlled by the clinician/therapist/shamanic guide
From what I can tell this is a drug user myth, and one of the reasons these drugs are a drop in the bucket compared to other illegal drugs. A "trip sitter" is certainly a good idea, to avoid people hurting themselves as a result of drug-induced beliefs, but they won't save you from randomly having a bad trip, and once users have had a couple of those, they lose enthusiasm for the drug. LSD and friends are less affected by user expec
Almost non-existent LD50... (Score:4, Informative)
No no no! (Score:2, Funny)
They shouldn't be trying such a desperate solution without trying chlorox and ivermectin first.
Re: No no no! (Score:2)
You forgot the onion poultice!
Re:If successful and it removes a VA disability cl (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm hopeful that he can get into the trial and at least be able to see fireworks without going into sniper mode.
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A little over 15 years ago, an acquaintance confided in me that he had been struggling with serious depression for years, and that he had decided to try psilocybin in a "recreational setting," as in not supervised by a doctor or other health professionals (which was not an option at the time anyway).
This is the only case I know of where somebody has tried this, and let's just say that it didn't go well.
I'm not a health professional, and I am not qualified to speak on the potential of psilocybin to treat men
Anecdotes are not data [Re:Good, Bad, and Ugly] (Score:3, Insightful)
... I'm also not a statistician, and I only have a single data point. But it is still reasonable to conclude from this one instance ...
It is reasonable to conclude absolutely nothing from this one instance.
Some guy taking an unknown and uncalibrated amount of a mushroom of unverified origin, and doing this with no medical knowledge, no medical advice, and no medical supervision gives exactly no useful information about the clinical efficacy.
Re: Anecdotes are not data [Re:Good, Bad, and Ugly (Score:2)
People taking uncalibrated and unverified stuff and claiming life-changing benefits are why we are testing this in the first place.
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If he did it alone this was a BIG mistake. Who you are with and in what circumstances is extremely critical for such an experience, even for those not struggling with issues. I suspect your friend didn't provide himself with a safe and comforting enough environment. Which is truly sad and my heart goes out to him.
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Re:Good, Bad, and Ugly (Score:4, Insightful)
Sounds like the VA needs better funding. Amazing how little the government cares for troops after they come back fubar. The entire VA staff can't be incompetent either. Most probably genuinely want to help people but are overwhelmed and underpaid. Plenty of money being thrown at departments of the government that don't help anyone.
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Sounds like the VA needs better funding.
They are already getting a half trillion US$ per year. Perhaps the Kansas Experiment needs to be repeated and confirmed before we put it next to Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history?
Re: Good, Bad, and Ugly (Score:2)
The government doesn't care about munitions after use, and it's always treated soldiers that way
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" Most probably genuinely want to help people but are overwhelmed and underpaid. "
From someone who utilizes the VA healthcare system, you hit the nail square on the head with the overwhelmed :D
part of your statement. I cannot comment on their payscales though as it isn't something they share with me
My experiences so far is the fact the VA has far more patients than they have providers and / or real estate.
For example, at the Houston facility, there are the morning team providers who share office space with
Re:Good, Bad, and Ugly (Score:5, Informative)
However, the VA is staffed by health professionals who are there because they can't cut it in private practice.
Well, if that's not a load of horseshit, then I've never seen a horse OR shit.
My own anecdotal evidence aside (as I work in a VA hospital), studies have been done to show that "[t]he VA often (but not always) performs better than or similarly to other systems of care with regard to the safety and effectiveness of care" [nih.gov]. Or how about the fact that a "nationwide Medicare survey...found that veterans rated Veterans Affairs hospitals higher than private health care facilities in all 10 categories of patient satisfaction" [npr.org].
Doctors are not working for the VA "because they can't cut it in private practice". Many of the health professionals I know at the VA work there because they are either former military themselves, or they feel a civic pride in giving back to those who served. The idea that the VA gives substandard healthcare is not only extremely false, but a lie that needs to be corrected.
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I apologize. I was speaking from my own experience (my father was medically discharged from a career in the Marines), which is not as extensive as yours. I still maintain that I've heard far more negative than positive anecdotes about the VA and their medical care in particular, but there you have it: Anecdotes.
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I still maintain that I've heard far more negative than positive anecdotes about the VA and their medical care in particular, but there you have it: Anecdotes.
Maybe that's more a condemnation of the American healthcare system overall. The VA may be better than private care, but perhaps there are so many complaints and horror stories about private care throughout society we've just tuned them out at this point.
Re: Good, Bad, and Ugly (Score:2)
Private care is so spectacularly bad that VA health care can be very bad and still be better.
I can't remember the last time I witnessed a hospital demonstrating general competence. Usually there are only a few people who can even do their jobs correctly and management is clinically worthless.
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My VA clinic (and the closest), hospital has gotten much worse since that article was written. Leaders are all about saving money over the patients, and covering their own tails. It was never perfect but the best providers are now driven out. They just can't keep them.
Unfortunately, I've lost trust in the 'specialty' clinics. They follow the same prioritize money and cya over patients. Community care could be good. It wasn't easy to try and use the DB of providers before, but now it's impossible. On VA.gov
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"However, the VA is staffed by health professionals who are there because they can't cut it in private practice"
1) Clear prejudicial statement made without any evidence. AI seems to think that VA nurse salaries are competitive, and nothing I found on the internet says otherwise.
2) Not helpful to your point. The general VA staff will not be doing this, it is experimental research. While some of the VA staff will be involved, research experiments are done by a combination of outside researchers and the more
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I honestly think they'd have a higher success rate if they let the patients go camping with friends and dose themselves that way
Same friends who will take you out for a snipe hunt at midnight? Just for the LULZ? Consider yourself lucky they didn't hand you a stick and get you to poke the bear.
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A good description is that they are amplifiers. They magnify everything in your sensorium to the point of distortion. Every thought, sound, emotion; all are pumped up to eleven. You don't have separate senses; they all blend into interacting feedback loops of synesthesia. Your thoughts become tangible, perceivable objects and sensations. It can get overwhelming and almost requires a light-hearted attitude.
It can be enlightening, fun as hell, or deeply terrifying, all depending on your attitude as you go int
Re:Sorry you're sad. Here's some drugs. (Score:4, Informative)
" A good description is that they are amplifiers. They magnify everything in your sensorium to the point of distortion.
Every thought, sound, emotion; all are pumped up to eleven. "
Exactly this. ^^^
My own word for it is sensory amplification. There is a very good reason the phrase " Set and Setting " is a thing in
the community who partakes in these substances.
Amplification to the point where, like spaceman stated, they tend to blend / overlap one another and you can start hearing
smells or smelling colors, seeing geometrical shapes, etc.
I had a routine where I would make sure all bedding was washed the day of and a full shower with unscented soaps in the
hours prior. If I didn't, the smells ( even just detergent or deoderant ) would translate into the experience and could be a large
variable in how the experience went. As I typically listened to headphones during the journey, the type of music on your playlist
will go a long way in the experience as well.
While the trials can mitigate the " setting " of the set / setting phrase mentioned above ( you need a safe / trusted space ) I am
unsure how this will play out with the other half ( the ' set ' or mindset ) part.
In my own experiences you needed to go into the session with a positive / happy / or even neutral mindset to experience a positive journey.
Going into such a thing with a mind damaged from PTSD would really give me pause due to the aforementioned amplification
characteristics of a psychedelic substances.
Though I will admit, the journey and outcome of a session is unique to the individual.
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After the (stupidest, evil) 'war on drugs', 'warr (Score:2)
Joke's in the title.
Nixon war is evil.
70 years lost to bigotry and fear.
money honey (Score:2)
If they just gave the money to the veterans instead of the investigators, I bet that would work a lot better.