Maybe It's Time for Medical LSD?

A study just came out which suggests that not only are psychedelics not bad for your long term mental health they might actually be good for it.  We are talking about but statistically significant reductions in certain mental health issues and trends in the almost all the rest:

Serious psychological distress. 

Lifetime psychedelic use was not significantly associated with serious psychological distress in the worst month of the past year. Among the specific psychedelics, lifetime psilocybin use (aOR 0.8, p = 0.009), lifetime mescaline use (aOR 0.9, p = 0.04), and past year LSD use (aOR 0.7, p = 0.01) were associated with lower rates of serious psychological distress. 

Mental health treatment. 

Lifetime psychedelic use was not significantly associated with any of the mental health treatment variables. Among the specific psychedelics there were a number of significant associations with lower rate of receiving or needing mental health treatment. Lifetime LSD use was significantly associated with a lower rate of outpatient mental health treatment (aOR 0.9, p= 0.002) and psychiatric medication prescription (aOR 0.9, p = 0.04). Lifetime psilocybin use was significantly associated with a lower rate of inpatient mental health treatment (aOR 0.8, p= 0.04) and psychiatric medication prescription (aOR 0.8, p = 0.00008). Lifetime mescaline/peyote use was significantly associated with a lower rate of psychiatric medication prescription (aOR 0.8, p = 0.004) and needed but did not receive mental health treatment (aOR 0.8, p = 0.001). Lifetime peyote use was significantly associated with a lower rate of psychiatric medication prescription (aOR 0.8, p = 0.01). 

Psychiatric symptom indicators. 

Lifetime psychedelic use was not significantly associated with any of the eight past year psychiatric symptom indicators (aOR range 0.8 to 1.1), and lifetime psychedelic use was significantly associated with a lower rate of one of the seven psychotic symptoms (“Felt a force taking over your mind”: aOR 0.7, p = 0.03). Among the specific psychedelics, lifetime psilocybin use was significantly associated with a lower rate of symptoms of panic attacks (aOR 0.9, p = 0.006), and lifetime mescaline/peyote use was significantly associated with a lower rate of symptoms of agoraphobia (aOR 0.6, p = 0.005). Lifetime psilocybin use and lifetime mescaline/peyote use was significantly associated with a lower rate of one of the specific psychotic symptoms (“Felt a force taking over your mind”: psilocybin, aOR 0.6, p = 0.004; mescaline/peyote: aOR 0.7, p = 0.04). 

Stratified samples. 

In a series of multivariate logistic regression analyzes stratified by gender (male; female), age (18 to 25 years; 26 and older), any past year illicit drug use (no; yes), or lifetime extremely stressful event ever (no; yes) there were no significant associations with lifetime psychedelic use and greater risk of any of the mental health outcomes. Rather, in twelve cases there was an association with psychedelic use and lower rate of various mental health outcomes; however, most of these cases had marginal statistical significance (0.05<p<0.01). Among females, psychedelic users had a lower rate of the psychotic symptom “felt force taking over mind” (aOR 0.5, 95% CI 0.3 to 0.7, p = 0.0005). Among younger people, psychedelic users had a lower rate of symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder (aOR 0.8, 95% CI 0.6 to 1.0, p = 0.03). Among older people, psychedelic users had a lower rate of psychiatric medications (aOR 0.9, 95% CI 0.8 to 1.0, p = 0.03) and the psychotic symptom “felt force taking over mind” (aOR 0.5, 95% CI 0.3 to 0.8, p = 0.01). Among people with past year illicit drug use, psychedelic users had a lower rate of inpatient mental health treatment (aOR 0.7, 95% CI 0.5 to 0.9, p = 0.02), needed mental health treatment (aOR 0.9, 95% CI 0.7 to 1.0, p = 0.04), symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder (aOR 0.7, 95% CI 0.5 to 1.0, p = 0.05), symptoms of agoraphobia (aOR 0.6, 95% CI 0.4 to 1.0, p = 0.05), and symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (aOR 0.7, 95% CI 0.5 to 1.0, p = 0.02). Among people without a lifetime extremely stressful event, psychedelic users had a lower rate of symptoms of psychosis (aOR 0.5, 95% CI 0.3 to 0.9, p = 0.03) and the psychotic symptoms “felt force inserting thoughts” (aOR 0.4, 95% CI 0.2 to 0.9, p= 0.02) and “felt force steal thoughts” (aOR 0.3, 95% CI 0.1 to 0.7, p = 0.008).

(h/t Reason)