The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has presented a report on the creation of a new type of therapy based on the use of psychoactive fungi in the treatment of patients with clinical depression. For the second time in a year, psilocybin therapy has proven effective in treating mental illness and depressive disorder, according to experts.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has presented a report on the creation of a new type of therapy based on the use of psychoactive fungi in the treatment of patients with clinical depression. For the second time in a year, psilocybin therapy has proven effective in treating mental illness and depressive disorder, according to experts.
Can depression be cured?
Back in late 2018, the FDA introduced the COMPASS Pathways program as a breakthrough therapy investigating psilocybin, a key psychoactive compound found in some hallucinogenic mushrooms, newatlas.com reports. So, according to a report from the FDA, the new therapy could help treat a disease that is resistant to other pharmacological drugs.
As you know, clinical depression is considered an acute form of mental illness, in which the patient completely loses interest in the world around him and is in a constant depressed mood, bordering on the appearance of suicidal tendencies. Today, hundreds of millions of people around the world suffer from chronic and acute depressive episodes lasting more than two weeks.
Charles Ryson, director of the Center for Clinical and Translational Research, believes that the introduction of psilobicin-based treatments for depression into medical practice is truly innovative. So, in the Usona Phase 2 study, it is planned to cover 80 patients, each of whom will be given an active dose of psilobicin or niacin, an active placebo. After preparatory psychotherapy sessions, the effect of a single dose of psilobicin will be assessed in terms of its effect on other mental illnesses.
Psilocybs - hallucinogenic mushrooms.
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Thus, the results of treatment with psilobicin for three months showed that after a week all patients showed a significant decrease in symptoms of depression, and at the end of the experiment, five out of twelve volunteers entered stable remission. Despite the fact that the experimental drug had short-term side effects in the form of confusion and anxiety, its further positive effect is due to additional stimulation of serotonin 5-HT2A receptors, the activation of which allows the patient to reduce general anxiety and reduce the level of anhedonia.
Research into the potential use of psilocybin for treating resistant depression should be completed in 2020, when scientists can provide some compelling evidence of how effective new psychedelic therapy is in treating some forms of lingering depression.
Daria Eletskaya