Serotonergic psychedelics and 3,4-methylendioxtmethamphetamine (MDMA) are promising treatments for mental disorders with a continuously evolving evidence base. We searched Pubmed/Scopus/clinical trial registries up to 08july2025 for double-blind randomized controlled trials (RCTs) testing MDMA or serotonergic psychedelics in patients with mental disorders. Primary outcomes were change in...
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a serious and chronic mental health condition with limited effective treatment options. 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphethamine (MDMA)-assisted psychotherapy (MDMA-AT) has shown promise in phase 2 and phase 3 clinical trials, with many research participants reporting significant reductions in PTSD symptoms. However, the Federal Drug Administration (FDA)...
PsychoactivesNovember 2, 2025Faith Ekoh, Shanice Rerrie, James Angud et al.2 citations
Today’s research highlights the therapeutic potential of the hallucinogen psilocybin in the treatment of pathologies associated with mood, cognitive, and affective dysregulation. These domains of function are regulated by the serotonergic system, which can be influenced by sex hormones, like estrogen and testosterone, and psychedelic compounds including psilocybin. Current evidence supports a...
Psychedelic therapy is commonly understood as a form of psychotherapy. However, despite promising results from clinical trials, scientific progress has been hindered by a lack of theoretical integration between the fields of psychedelic and psychotherapy research. This article seeks to bridge this divide by outlining a transtheoretical understanding of psychedelic-occasioned psychological...
The global prevalence of depression is high, and there are concerns about the therapeutic effectiveness of current treatments. Research over the past two decades has led to a new class of alternative treatments termed 'psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT).' This study aimed to investigate the attitudes toward the application and use of psychedelic-assisted therapies in the United Kingdom...
Background Psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy (PAP) has gained attention as a promising intervention for conditions including depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, but understanding of its side-effects is limited. This review evaluates the quality of side-effects reporting in PAP trials, to guide treatment, policy and research. Aims To assess side-effects reporting quality in...
BACKGROUND: Over the past ten years, several psychedelic compounds, including tryptamines like lysergic acid diethylamide/LSD, psilocybin, ayahuasca, and dimethyltryptamine/DMT, have been tested in clinical trials for a range of psychiatric conditions, such as anxiety and depression. While these compounds are relatively available for treatment, ketamine and its S(+) enantiomer, esketamine, are...
There has been a renewed interest in the use of various psychedelic agents as potential therapies for multiple psychiatric conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), major depressive disorder (MDD), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), to name a few. This follows the recent accumulation of evidence for ketamine pharmacotherapy and a rapid proliferation of clinics/programs...
Psychedelic treatments are considered to involve unique treatment challenges relative to other psychiatric interventions, though these are typically not explored in detail within clinical trial reports. To determine the types of challenges that providers encounter while administering psychedelic drugs in research settings and to assess provider opinions on safeguards that may be pursued to...
Background/Objectives: Patients in palliative care often experience multifaceted forms of suffering that extend beyond physical symptoms, including existential distress, loss of meaning, and emotional pain. Ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) has emerged as a promising intervention for alleviating such complex forms of suffering, yet models specifically tailored to palliative populations...
ABSTRACT Psychedelics offer an intriguing novel method for changing minds, supposedly by destabilizing the neurobiology of the belief system. The resulting power to change minds raises ethical and epistemic concerns. This article examines the epistemic status of psychedelic experiences and suggests a skeptical attitude towards beliefs formed under their influence, a position that stands in...
As psychedelic-assisted therapies gain prominence, queer and non-binary individuals remain largely marginalized within this emerging field. This Critical Interpretive Synthesis (CIS) reviews 44 empirical studies (2014–2024) to explore how queer experiences are represented and erased in psychedelic research. Guided by queer theory, intersectionality, and post-psychiatry frameworks, the synthesis...
Background: Results from contemporary clinical trials of serotonergic psychedelic therapies have led to an increasing focus on their potential clinical use across mental disorders. However, studies examining mechanisms of clinical response to psychedelic therapy in psychiatric populations are limited. This review aimed to synthesize evidence from studies examining biomarkers of clinical...
Social WorkOctober 1, 2025Heidi L Allen, Brooke L Stott
With MDMA, LSD, and psilocybin receiving “Breakthrough Therapy” designation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and moving into Phase 3 clinical trials, we are closer than ever to legal administration of these compounds for mental health treatment. Research from Lykos, Usona Institute, Mindmed, Compass Pathways, and Johns Hopkins, among others, has shown promising efficacy of the...
Background: Job-related stress and its extreme form, burnout, continue to affect almost half of all frontline healthcare workers and first responders. Current treatments are inadequate. Objectives: To evaluate a model of ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) delivered in a group format to address symptoms of anxiety, depression, trauma, and burnout via repeated measures of the Generalized...
CortexOctober 1, 2025Roger Koenig-Robert, Rebecca Keogh, Joel Pearson3 citations
Psychedelic therapy is on the rise, as its legalisation is ongoing in multiple countries. Here, we write a note of warning regarding recent reports that people with aphantasia (a blind mind's eye) have acquired visual mental imagery after using psychedelics. While the prospect of gaining, or indeed increasing, visual mental imagery is appealing to many, strong mental imagery has been associated...
Psychedelic compounds are gaining renewed attention across disciplines for their profound psychological and neurobiological effects. Emerging research highlights their efficacy in treating mood disorders, PTSD, and addiction by enhancing neuroplasticity and disrupting maladaptive cognitive patterns. From a psychological standpoint, psychedelics facilitate introspection, emotional processing,...
PAP combined with structured psychological support shows sustained reductions in depressive symptoms for treatment-resistant depression and major depressive disorder. Higher doses generally yield stronger benefits. While PAP holds significant potential as a holistic treatment, methodological limitations, such as heterogeneity in study designs, inconsistent levels of psychological support and...
Abstract Background & Aims There are few effective treatments for methamphetamine use disorder, despite increasing global demand. Here, we assessed the safety and feasibility of outpatient psilocybin‐assisted psychotherapy for methamphetamine use disorder. Design Single arm, open label pilot study. Setting Outpatient public stimulant treatment program at St. Vincent's Hospital, Sydney,...
Psychedelic-assisted therapy is currently in its second wave and enjoying a renaissance of sorts. This article describes a narrative therapy–inspired approach to working therapeutically with psychedelics. My intent in writing this paper is to provide a model for how narrative therapy ideas in practice can be applied to the three stages of psychedelic-assisted therapy: preparation, medicine work...