Psychedelics Have ‘Demonstrated Potential For Treating Drug Addiction’ And Alcoholism, New Research Shows

Two new studies on psychedelics and alcoholism—including one with contributions from a top federal drug official—offer hope for new ways to treat alcohol use disorder (AUD).

One says a single dose of psilocybin “was safe and effective in reducing alcohol consumption in AUD patients,” while the other concludes that classic psychedelics like psilocybin and LSD “have demonstrated potential for treating drug addiction, especially AUD.”

The first study looked at 10 treatment-seeking adults “with severe AUD,” according to a preprint version of the research published online at Research Square. After a single 25 milligram dose of psilocybin, “alcohol consumption significantly decreased” during a 12-week period, the team found.

Coauthored by National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Director Nora Volkow—in her role at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism’s neuroimaging laboratory—along with 10 researchers at the University of Copenhagen, in Denmark, the open-label study found that most participants craved alcohol less and consumed fewer drinks following treatment with psilocybin.

“Participants reported a decrease from baseline to week 1 in alcohol craving,” the paper says—a decrease that was sustained four weeks and 12 weeks after the psychedelic was administered. “Further, participants reported an immediate change from baseline to week 1 in self-efficacy, i.e. confidence in the ability to abstain from alcohol.”

“We observed marked improvements in drinking outcomes, with a large effect size.”

That sense of self-efficacy also stayed elevated during the 12-week period after taking psilocybin.

Most participants also meaningfully reduced their alcohol consumption, both in terms of drinks per day as well as heavy drinking days.

“Individual analyses revealed that at week 4, nine of the 10 participants significantly reduced drinks per day,” authors wrote, “and at 12 weeks, seven of the 10 participants still reported significantly reduced drinks per day.”

Researchers also found no meaningful changes in measures of depressive symptoms, psychological flexibility or trait mindfulness.

“In this open-label study, single-dose psilocybin therapy treatment for AUD showed feasibility, safety, and efficacy in improving drinking outcomes during a 12-week period,” the study says, noting that the findings “align with existing data showing a decrease in alcohol craving, temptation and an increase in self-efficacy…reinforcing the potential benefits of this therapeutic approach.”

“Consistent with the accumulating evidence supporting the notion that the subjective effects play a central role for the long-term efficacy,” it continues, “our exploratory analysis suggests that profound mystical-type experiences were associated with sustained improvements in reducing heavy drinking days.”

Authors of the study, which has not been peer-reviewed, did note some limitations, including the small sample that consisted of only two women and the lack of a control group or any blinding, which they noted “prohibits any causal conclusions regarding efficacy.”

“Additionally, selection bias due to self-referral and high expectations from positive widespread media coverage may have influenced, at least in part, the observed positive effects,” the team wrote, echoing findings of another recent paper on psychedelic-assisted therapy. “Therefore, larger, placebo-controlled single-dose trials, currently underway, are necessary to establish firm conclusions.”

The other new study, published in the journal Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology and Biological Psychiatry, analyzed previous research into classic psychedelics and concluded that the substances “have demonstrated potential for treating drug addiction, especially AUD, mostly by modulating neuroplasticity in the brain.”

“Given that serotonergic psychedelics do not produce physical dependence or withdrawal symptoms with repeated use,” it says, “they may be considered promising treatment options for managing drug use disorders.”

“Psychedelic substances have demonstrated potential for treating drug addiction.”

Nevertheless, the research cautions that psychedelic-assisted treatments don’t appear to be universally effective across patients.

“Although many participants achieve positive results with only one treatment dose in clinical studies, great inter-individual variability exists in the duration of these effects,” says the abstract of the report, authored by a three-person research team at the University of Southern Santa Catarina, in Brazil. “Therefore, further studies using different doses and experimental protocols should be conducted to enhance evidence about psychedelic substances.”

Decades after early research showed that psychedelic-assisted therapy might offer profound benefits to people suffering from substance use disorder, more investigation is now being done.

For instance, the National Institutes of Health will put $2.4 million toward funding studies on the use of psychedelics to treat methamphetamine use disorders, according to a recently announced grant. The money comes as federal health officials note sharp increases in deaths from methamphetamine and other psychostimulants in recent years, with fatal overdoses involving the substances rising nearly fivefold between 2015 and 2022.

NIDA, the federal agency that provided the new $2.4 million grant, last year announced a $1.5 million funding round to further study psychedelics and addiction.

Other recent research has also suggested that psychedelics could unlock promising new pathways to treat addiction. Last year, for example, a first-of-its-kind analysis offered novel insights into exactly how psychedelic-assisted therapy works for people with alcohol use disorder.

And earlier this year, the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), which is part of the National Institutes of Health, identified the treatment of alcohol use disorder as one of a number of possible benefits of psilocybin, despite the substance remaining a Schedule I controlled substance under U.S. law.

The agency highlighted a 2022 study that “suggested that psilocybin may be helpful for alcohol use disorder.” The research found people who were in psilocybin-assisted therapy had fewer heavy-drinking days over 32 weeks than the control group, which NCCIH said “suggests that psilocybin may be helpful for alcohol use disorder.”

Separately, research from 2019 indicated that CBD may also have the potential to treat substance use disorders involving cocaine, amphetamine and methamphetamine—adding to earlier research showing the cannabinoid has the potential to help people battling substance use disorders involving alcohol and opioids.

Findings of another recent study suggested the use of full-spectrum psychedelic mushroom extract has a more powerful effect than chemically synthesized psilocybin alone, which could have implications for psychedelic-assisted therapy. The findings imply that the experience of entheogenic mushrooms may involve a so-called “entourage effect” similar to what’s observed with cannabis and its many components.

Meanwhile, the government has for years been funding research into the development of psychedelics-related drugs that don’t cause a psychedelic trip, working to decouple the potential health benefits of entheogens from the psychedelic experience.

In 2020, for example, a project funded by $26.9 million from the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) “aims to create new medications to effectively and rapidly treat depression, anxiety, and substance abuse without major side effects.”

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Photo courtesy of Wikimedia/Workman.