Background Anorexia nervosa is a debilitating eating disorder with high mortality and chronicity rates owing to the paucity of effective existing treatments. Several clinical trials using psilocybin therapy have demonstrated therapeutic efficacy and safety in psychiatric conditions, including anorexia nervosa. Aims This study aimed to further assess the safety, feasibility and potential...
Background: Across psychotherapeutic frameworks, the strength of the therapeutic alliance has been found to correlate with treatment outcomes; however, its role has never been formally assessed in a trial of psychedelic-assisted therapy. We aimed to investigate the relationships between therapeutic alliance and rapport, the quality of the acute psychedelic experience and treatment outcomes....
Background: Anorexia nervosa (AN) is a serious and life-threatening psychiatric condition. With a paucity of approved treatments, there is a desperate need for novel treatment avenues to be explored. Here, we present (1) an overview of the ways through which Public Patient Involvement (PPI) has informed a trial of psilocybin-assisted therapy for AN and (2) a protocol for a pilot study of...
In recent years there has been a resumption of research into the potential therapeutic benefits of psychedelic1 drugs such as MDMA2, psilocybin and LSD3. Clinical research suggests significant efficacy for psychiatric disorders that have traditionally been hard to treat. The evidence base has accumulated to the point that psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy appears to be moving from a fringe...
The traditional bio-psycho-social model of psyche is inadequate for our understanding of expanded states of consciousness such as reflected in psychedelic experiences and cases of spiritual emergency. I suggest that adding an archetypal perspective to produce a bio-psycho-socio-archetypal (BPSA) model gives us a more complete picture. I will begin with a description of a spiritual emergency...
‘Our normal waking consciousness, rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all around it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go through life without suspecting their existence, but apply the requisite stimulus, and at a touch they are there in all their...