LSD-assisted psychotherapy in patients with terminal cancer
This open-label study (n=60, 1973) with LSD and DPT for end-of-life anxiety related to terminal cancer found that patients significantly improved on mood/psychological scores (29% 'dramatic', 42% 'moderate', 23% 'unchanged', 6% 'decrement'). The study also found a non-significant trend towards lower narcotic medication use.
Abstract
The paper describes the results of a clinical study exploring the potential of a complex psychotherapeutic program utilizing psychedelic compounds to alleviate the emotional and physical suffering of cancer patients. A total of 60 cancer patients participated in this experimental study. In 44 of these patients, LSD (200-500 p%per os) was administered as an adjunct to psychotherapy; in 19 patients, a new psychedelic compound, dipropyltryptamine (DPT) was administered (60-105 mg i.m.). Three of these patients received both LSD and DPT administered on different sessions. The therapeutic results were assessed by means of a rating scale reflecting the degree of the patients’ depression, psychological isolation, anxiety, difficulty in management, fear of death, and pain. The ratings were done by attending physicians, nurses, family members, LSD therapists and cotherapists, and independent raters. In addition, the amount of narcotics required in the management of the patient was measured before and after the psychedelic sessions. Systematic rating was carried out in a group of 31 cancer patients treated by LSD. The comparison of the means of individual ratings from pre- to posttreatment showed significant improvement in all the measured parameters for most of the raters. There was a definite reduction of the narcotic medication; it did not, however, reach the level of statistical significance. The pre- to post-treatment comparison of the global indexes used as gross indicators of the degree of emotional and physical distress, indicated that approximately 29 % of the patients showed dramatic improvement, and another 41.9 % moderate improvement, with 22.6 % essentially unchanged. In 6.4 % of the patients, global indexes showed a decrement in the posttherapy ratings.
Research Summary of 'LSD-assisted psychotherapy in patients with terminal cancer'
Introduction
Stanislav and colleagues situate their work in the context of renewed clinical interest in the psychotherapeutic use of psychedelic drugs after early exploratory research in the 1950s and 1960s. Earlier reports suggested that LSD could produce profound subjective, 'psychedelic' experiences that sometimes led to reductions in anxiety and depression and to shifts in personal meaning and behaviour. A small number of prior clinical observations, notably by Kast and a single-case report by Cohen, had also suggested that LSD might lessen distress in patients in the late phases of terminal cancer, and these limited findings motivated the present clinical programme. This paper describes a clinical treatment series in which LSD (and, in some cases, DPT) was administered as an adjunct to brief but intensive psychotherapy for patients with terminal malignancy. The stated objectives were to use the psychedelic experience to reduce emotional distress (depression, anxiety, isolation), affect the patient's attitude toward dying, and, secondarily, to assess effects on pain and narcotic use. The authors also frame the work as preparatory to more controlled studies and note the particular methodological challenges of research in terminally ill populations.
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Study Details
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Grof, S., Goodman, L., Richards, W., & Kurland, A. (1973). LSD-assisted psychotherapy in patients with terminal cancer. International Pharmacopsychiatry, 8(3), 129-144. https://doi.org/10.1159/000467984
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