25C-NBOMe, sold online as legal LSD or under names like 'N-bomb' and 'Pandora', is a partial agonist of 5-HT2A receptors that carries a high risk of overdose, with acute toxicity and fatalities reported. It is taken orally, sublingually, nasally, by injection, vaginally, rectally, or smoked, producing effects such as sublingual numbing, stimulation, hallucinations, dissociation, and anxiety. Its use is an emerging phenomenon increased by low-cost online availability, and health professionals should be informed about this trend.
People who use novel psychoactive substances (NPS) often self-administer olanzapine to manage psychotic crises or 'bad trips,' a practice facilitated by online sharing of experiences and easy access to medications. Exploratory searches of 163 discussion forums and websites in four languages from November 2012 to 2013 found that olanzapine is the most frequently self-prescribed drug for this purpose, typically taken for a few days at 5–50 mg/day. Only a few formal studies have assessed olanzapine's effectiveness for NPS-induced psychosis, yet pro-drug websites describe it as the 'ideal' molecule to terminate bad trips. Health professionals should be informed about risks of olanzapine misuse.
Depressed patients often have disturbed, negatively toned dreams. In 27 women with major depressive disorder starting escitalopram, dream recall and quality were impaired at baseline. After 8 weeks of treatment, alongside reduced depression severity, patients reported significant improvements in the quantity and quality of dream recall, dream emotional content, and dream complexity. Patients with less clinical improvement continued to report impaired dream experiences. Changes in specific dream characteristics—such as subjective recall, recall quality, emotional content, and complexity—appear to be reliable markers of antidepressant therapy effectiveness.