Study: Personal Psychedelic Use Common Among Therapists
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Therapists who administer psychedelic treatments to patients apparently like to use psychedelics themselves. That is the chief takeaway of a new study published in the journal Psychedelic Medicine, revealing that “Personal experience with psychedelics was notably common in this sample of psychedelic therapists.” The findings, the authors of the study noted, are “the first to delineate the personal use of psychedelics among professionals and can inform a pressing debate for the field.” That psychedelic therapists use psychedelics might seem like a “dog bites man” caliber headline, but as the authors noted, an “emerging controversy in psychedelic therapy regards the appropriateness or necessity of psychedelic therapists having personal experience using psychedelics themselves.” “Although there are a number of potential advantages and disadvantages to personal use among psychedelic therapists, no studies to date have measured their use or other aspects of their training,” they wrote.  For the study, the researchers said that they “broadly review[ed] the literature on experiential learning in psychotherapy and psychiatry as well as the history of personal use of psychedelics by professionals,” and then reported “on the results of a survey that was sent to all 145 therapists associated with Usona Institute’s Phase II clinical trial of psilocybin for major depressive disorder.” They said that 32 of those individuals participated in the survey, representing a 22% response rate.  In their conclusion, the authors said that “study was limited by a low response rate and a lack of diversity among participants,” as “the majority of psychedelic therapists identified as white, female, and having doctoral degrees.”  The authors also noted that six individuals “did not fully complete the survey and were removed from all analyses,” and that “all six of these participants stopped the survey when prompted to answer questions regarding their personal substance use.” “Future research is needed to…

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