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Psychedelic Knowledge and Opinions in Psychiatrists at Two Professional Conferences: An Exploratory Survey

Brian S. Barnett, Yvan Beaussant, Franklin King, Rick Doblin

Journal of Psychoactive Drugs August 19, 2021 DOI: 10.1080/02791072.2021.1957183 (opens in new tab)

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Study at a glance

AI-extracted from the abstract
Characteristics Cross-sectional survey Peer reviewed
Sample size 106
Population Psychiatrists attending psychedelic didactic presentations at two national meetings
Topics Addiction
Keywords Legalization Exploratory research Social science
Citations 64
Key findings Psychiatrists largely believe psychedelics show treatment promise and strongly support federal funding for medicinal psychedelic research, with concerns about provider training, therapy logistics, contraindications, and diversion.

Abstract

Despite resurgent interest in psychedelic-assisted therapy, our insights into psychiatrists' knowledge and opinions about medicinal psychedelic applications are surprisingly narrow. Therefore, we anonymously surveyed psychiatrists attending psychedelic didactic presentations at two national meetings about these issues using a 26-item questionnaire. Response rate was 40.20% (106/264). Respondents were 41.73 ± 13.31 years old (range: 24-80) and 64.42% were male. They largely believed psychedelics show treatment promise and strongly supported federal funding for medicinal psychedelic research. The most common concerns were the lack of trained psychedelic-assisted therapy providers, the logistics of psychedelic-assisted therapy delivery, the administration of psychedelics for patients with contraindications, and diversion. The most desired psychedelic-related educational topics were potential benefits of psychedelic-assisted therapy, how to conduct psychedelic-assisted therapy, psychedelic pharmacology, and psychedelic side effects. Factors associated with increased belief in psychedelics' treatment potential included working primarily in research, scoring higher on a psychedelic knowledge test, and reporting less concern about psychedelics' addictive potential. Working primarily in research and consult-liaison psychiatry fellowship training were positively associated with support for medicinal psychedelic legalization, while increased concerns about addictive potential and attending psychiatrist status were negatively associated. Support for legalization of non-medicinal psychedelic use was negatively associated with age and positively associated with support for legalization of medicinal psychedelic use.

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Study Year Design Participants
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Client and counselor attitudes toward the use of medications for treatment of opioid dependence. Counselors and clients from outpatient, methadone, and residential drug treatment programs 2007 Cross-sectional survey n = 1,459

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Addiction Psychedelic-assisted therapy