Forget Prozac, Gimme the Shrooms!

A recent medical study suggests that mind-altering drugs, such as LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide), may be useful in the treatment of people suffering from depression, compulsive disorders and other conditions.

Take A Couple Hits of Acid and Call Me in the Morning

Did you do a double-take on that too? Well, it's true - a recent Swiss study, conducted at Zurich's University of Psychiatry, suggests that mind altering drugs, like LSD and other psychedelics, may actually be useful in treating people who suffer from either chronic pain or certain psychiatric disorders.

According to Franz Vollenweider of the Neuropsychopharmacology and brain imaging unit at ZUHP, "Psychedelics can give patients a new perspective - particularly when things like suppressed memories come up - and then they can work with that experience." Recent studies have also found Ecstacy (MDMA) is helpful in bridging gaps and opening doors between doctor and patient and that LSD has also been proven to help those suffering from cluster headaches.

Don't rush out and buy medicinal shrooms though - experts say it depends on the individual taking the drug, the dose they are administered and the situation surrounding them, but psychedelic drugs can have a wide range of effects, ranging from bliss to panic. While studies show that these drugs may be very useful in helping to treat some conditions, they also have the potential to be very dangerous as well.

Healing the Human Mind

By using mind-altering chemicals, it's believed that doctors may be able to administer low doses of the drug and use it to help people face and learn to cope with certain aspects of their life. Scientists hope that, given time, patients may learn to deal with psychological problems like depression and eventually overcome it, simply by overcoming the mental barriers.

Having been diagnosed with clinical depression and suspected Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), these treatment ideas leave me very leery and skeptical. I can still recall some of the flashbacks that I used to suffer and the concept of taking hallucinogenic drugs, in an effort to confront and move past these memories, is a very frightening one. Would the drugs have helped me to cope with the pain and recurring memories I experienced, or would it have only made things worse? While I have no problems with the concept of legalizing marijuana, the thought of giving LSD to people smacks strongly of old government experiments and places you just don't want to go. In this case, I would suggest to "Just say no."

Sources:

http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2006/January/LSD.asp - Information on LSD

http://www.coolove.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=144 - More medicinal drugs