First use of LSD: effects on mental health

We currently find few studies evaluating changes in psychological variables after a first use of psychedelics. This is due, among other things, to the fact that it is extremely difficult to find people who are going to start using drugs.

Generally, the samples used already have a lot of experience or, if not, they are carefully selected, ensuring the total and absolute absence of any psychopathological traits, thus reducing the external validity of the results. That is, the possibility of extrapolating the findings to the entire population.

In order to obtain information on these first consumptions, the psychologist Genís Oña, researcher at the Medical Anthropology Research Center of the Rovira i Virgili University and the recently deceased psychologist Juan Spuch, began a research project in the middle of 2014. The preliminary results of this project were presented at the international Breaking Convention, which was held at the University of Greenwich, in London.

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In context: the therapeutic potential of psychedelics

Recently, psychedelic drugs like LSD wave psilocybin They are starring in many journalistic or popular articles, in which they talk about possible therapeutic applications.

And it is that, after several decades of prohibition in which any attempt at scientific research was ipso annulled Facto, laboratories, hospitals and universities around the world are conducting new studies on these substances with the aim of developing new pharmacological therapies.

Despite this prolonged "scientific gap", many users turned to, and continue to use, these substances for medical reasons. Not a few consumers noticed beneficial effects, often unexpected, about your anxiety, your mood or about illnesses like cluster headaches after psychedelic drug use. Due to the needs of these patients and of so many others likely to achieve some improvement in their situation, institutions as important as Scientific American or the British Journal of Psychiatry, have launched express requests in recent years to reactivate this "research psychedelic ”.

Until now they already knew each other some therapeutic potentialities of some of these substancesHowever, new studies have appeared that have raised new unknowns. One of them is, for example, what happens when someone who has never taken this type of drug makes their first use? We could easily encounter this situation in the future if these treatments were approved, as many patients potential would never have tried these drugs, and we need to know exactly what the effects of this first Contact.

How the research on the effects of LSD was done

In their study, Genís Oña and Juan Spuch managed to reunite 9 young university students who met the profile wanted: they had no previous experience in the use of psychedelic drugs and in the near future they had planned consume LSD.

"The objective was to respect the natural course of the situation at all times," explains Genís. “We did not want to modify the consumption context thinking of administering the substance in a hospital, as in the rest of clinical trials. We wanted to see what really happens, in real situations. Something that is halfway between the pragmatic tests or the ethnographic methodology ”.

The variables included in the study were anxiety levels, depression, a measure of general psychopathology, a personality profile and the level of satisfaction with life. These were analyzed with standardized tests.

These dimensions were evaluated approximately one week before consumption took place. and 30 days after said consumption. A three-month follow-up was also carried out to check the stability over time of the possible changes produced. In addition, a control group that did not consume LSD was used in which the same tests were administered.

The effects of this drug in the first consumptions

The first results indicated clear differences in the baseline levels of some variables between the two groups. Apparently, the group that planned to use LSD was more depressed, with more presence of psychopathological features such as obsessions, compulsions or psychoticism, and with less satisfaction with life compared to the control group.

This changed after consumption. The data obtained in the retest showed a significant decrease, not only in these variables, where they differed from the control group, but also in others, such as the level of anxiety, neuroticism, hostility, or somatizations. In this way, no significant differences could be found between the two groups in any variable and in the experimental group a general significant improvement was observed after the experience.

The information obtained from the follow-up carried out at three months suggests some stability in these changes, since these could still be appreciated significantly with respect to the levels basal. Likewise, no significant differences were found between the two groups.

The beneficial potential of LSD

Does this mean that a first use of LSD can be beneficial? It is probable. However, we must bear in mind the limitations of the study and be cautious in interpreting its results.

First, the sample was relatively small and, furthermore, there was poor control for extraneous variables that cannot be controlled outside of a clinical trial. Second, the effect of the psychedelic experience can be interpreted as an experience deeply positive, since for all the subjects who consumed LSD it represented a unique and unrepeatable. In fact, more than half of them rated it as one of the best experiences of their life. “Perhaps this effect” -explains Genís Oña- “is comparable to other profoundly positive experiences that we live alone very occasionally, such as traveling to a distant country or spending a day in a park attractions ”.

Anyway, these results seem legitimize scientific research on the therapeutic potential of these substancesWell, if we can observe these beneficial effects without having any psychotherapeutic context, the potential of these substances using a suitable context seems very promising.

Many details of the study have had to be ignored due to its complexity, but the full article published in the Journal of Transpersonal Research.