Can you imagine taking a single dose of magic mushrooms and curing depression?
The study, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, followed 15 patients who received a unique treatment of psilocybin (the main compound in magic mushrooms) and found four years later, that 80% of patients still experienced significant improvements in anxiety and depression. Participants attributed the changes to psychedelic therapy.
In this post, you will know if it is true that a single dose of magic mushrooms cures depression.
A dose of magic mushrooms or antidepressants?
Like psychotherapy, antidepressants are a key part of treating depression. Its goal is to relieve symptoms and prevent the recurrence of the disease.
But many specialists such as Dr. David Nutt point out that antidepressants only help a small percentage of people and side effects when starting with them can include nausea, headache, gastrointestinal discomfort, dizziness, weight gain, restlessness, insomnia, and tiredness, among others.
After a few weeks of treatment, people who achieve good results with antidepressants manage to feel emotionally stable and can follow a normal daily routine because symptoms such as restlessness, anxiety, and negative or suicidal thoughts are relieved.
But the effects only last as long as you take antidepressants. When they are stopped, the person may experience severe withdrawal symptoms. And perhaps most importantly, antidepressants don’t treat the root cause of depression or anxiety, Dr. Nutt notes.
Psilocybin is an alternative to treat depression
Meanwhile, psilocybin seems to offer a different and longer-lasting alternative. Dr. Nutt and his team of researchers have conducted a second trial of psilocybin in humans to treat depression.
In this trial, 20 patients who had not responded to drug treatment for depression received two doses of psilocybin one week apart. Nutt’s team found rapid and lasting improvements in patients’ health.
None of the patients required traditional antidepressants for the first five weeks after testing. Six months later, they had follow-up tests that showed many of their depressive symptoms were still absent.
Although the studies are yielding positive results, Dr. Nutt warns that the trials have been done in controlled environments and patients are accompanied by therapists who give them psychotherapy during the psychedelic journey.
It should be noted that in this trial the researchers gave doses of synthetic psilocybin, the psychedelic compound found in magic mushrooms, “so we are frank in pointing out that we did not get evidence from studies that would take it for granted, that a dose of magic mushrooms cures depression if a person consumes them in their natural form.
What we did get was many testimonies from people on the Internet who report a resounding improvement in their depression, and even some talk about their cure after taking microdoses of magic mushrooms.
The follow-up to this 2016 study by Dr. Nutt found that most participants experienced improvements in anxiety and depression years later.
In this study a single dose of synthetic psilocybin was given to a group of cancer patients to relieve depression and anxiety, resulting in 4 years later 80% of them still experiencing significant improvements in cancer-related depression and anxiety.
Other studies and testimonies
But a team led by Robin Carhart-Harris of the Centre for Psychedelic Research in London found that a control group had not been involved in Dr. Nutt’s study, so it conducts similar tests with such controls in place, to get more concrete results.
So far, patient testimonials report huge improvements in health. One patient, named Andy, says all standard treatments had failed him. No therapy had helped him find an underlying cause of his depression. But he notes that psilocybin gave him a missing piece of the puzzle. She was “the one who changed things.”
? Another testimony that we find reviewed in The New York Times is that of Octavian Mihai; a patient who had just finished treatment for stage 3 Hodgkin lymphoma and participated in a study from New York University Langone Medical Center looking at whether psilocybin could reduce anxiety and depression in cancer patients.
In the trial, Octavian took a single dose of psilocybin and experienced a deep 8-hour journey in a controlled environment, accompanied by a therapist as well.
Octavian’s testimony is moving, saying that with just one dose he made peace.
The results of that study, and a similar small controlled trial, were surprising. Most cancer patients showed clinically significant reductions in both psychological disorders, with a sustained response about seven months after taking a single dose. Side effects were minimal.
In both trials, the intensity of the mystical experience described by the patients was directly related to the degree to which their depression and anxiety decreased.
Is psilocybin the cure for depression?
Psilocybin was rejected by governments in the 60s as a dangerous substance. And for decades, evidence suggesting psilocybin could be therapeutic was buried in the books.
But over the past decade, a resurgence of psychedelic research has produced new insights. Some laboratories and research groups are conducting human trials, so we will soon be able to confirm what several studies are discovering about the use of magic mushrooms for the effective treatment of various diseases, including depression.
To the question we were looking to answer, about whether a single dose of magic mushrooms cures depression; we do not get scientific evidence for now to support this claim; although the aforementioned studies give a clear orientation that magic mushrooms have a positive impact on people with depression and anxiety and that we will soon be able to confirm with studies; but testimonials from people with positive results abound on the Internet.
Read more: Magic mushrooms can ‘reset’ the brain
