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Integrative Psychiatry

Resetting the Mind: LSD for Generalized Anxiety Disorder

By October 25, 2024No Comments

LSD (c) has shown mental health potential since April 19, 1943, the day Albert Hofmann, who first synthesized LSD, accidentally dosed himself and immediately understood its potential for understanding human consciousness. Hofmann could tell from the start that LSD might have therapeutic benefits, taken mindfully and within a safe context. After decades of psychedelic prohibition, LSD is once again emerging in research as a powerful tool in mental health treatment. In March 2024, the FDA granted Breakthrough Therapy status to Mind Medicine (MindMed) Inc.’s LSD compound, MM120, for generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).

What the Research Tells Us

Although published clinical trials are still limited, evidence supporting LSD’s role in the mental health space is accumulating. A study from 2023 shows that two dosing sessions of 200 micrograms of LSD reduced anxiety and comorbid depression among both individuals with and without life-threatening illness. Psychotherapy was provided during study visits between dosing sessions. A one-year follow-up study showed sustained effects of LSD, with overall improvements in symptoms of anxiety and depression. 33% of individuals remained in remission for anxiety while 47% were in remission for depression.

This year, MindMed reported results from their phase 2b clinical trial of lysergide d-tartrate, an analog of LSD they call MM120. These results, which have not yet been peer-reviewed, show that a single dose of 100 ug MM120 greatly improved anxiety symptoms, measured by the Hamilton Anxiety rating scale (HAM-A), compared to placebo. MindMed reported that 65% of participants showed a clinically significant response rate, and 48% achieved and maintained remission up to 12 weeks of follow up. Interestingly, psychotherapy was not provided as part of the therapeutic dosing session in this study. Safety and efficacy data from this trial met FDA requirements to meet designation by FDA as a Breakthrough Therapy.

LSD, like other psychedelics, seems to address the underlying psychological challenges that lead to symptoms of anxiety. Rather than working at the level of symptoms, LSD allows for a shift in consciousness that is described as transformative. These changes in the embodied experience of self can help open a person to new perspectives and understandings about themselves, their stories, and their emotions. Enhancing self-compassion might be one way that LSD supports the therapeutic process.

Breakthrough Therapy Designation: What Does It Mean?

The FDA reserves Breakthrough Therapy status for treatments that show potential for substantial improvement over existing options. This status fast-tracks the development and review process, with the goal of efficiently getting promising therapies out to the medical community. For the medical and psychotherapeutic communities, this designation is important because it signals that another psychedelic intervention, along with MDMA and psilocybin, is being seen as a hopeful treatment for mental health conditions. However, we have also seen, in recent developments with MDMA-assisted therapy, that Breakthrough Therapy Designation does not mean the FDA will immediately approve it as a legal and marketable substance.

Moving Forward

Among the mental health community, LSD and other psychedelic-assisted therapies offer the potential of new possibilities for growth and healing. One of the most promising aspects of psychedelic-assisted therapy is its ability to rapidly support wellbeing. These therapies are appealing to many who have struggled for years and have not benefited from traditional medications or treatment methods.

Because psychedelics work by altering perception and bringing forward potentially challenging material from the unconscious, these powerful medicines cannot be taken lightly. Side effects of LSD are still being researched, and there is much work to do to understand how each person’s unique genetics, life history, and current biopsychology might impact their experience of LSD-assisted therapy. Many scientists are hesitant about the mainstream hype around psychedelics, urging mindfulness and intentionality rather than “quick fixes.”

Conclusion

LSD is proving to be an effective tool in the treatment of anxiety. LSD, like other psychedelics, might help clients move through a “stuck” state of mind toward psychological flexibility. As we eagerly await the unfolding of research and regulations, we can get curious about the nuances and complexities of using psychedelics for uplifting and sustaining mental health.

Sara Reed, MS, LMFT

Sara Reed is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and CEO of Mind’s iHealth Solutions, a digital health company that provides evidence based and culturally responsible mental health services for underserved groups. As a mental health futurist and clinical researcher, Sara examines the ways culture informs the way we diagnose and treat mental illness. Sara’s prior research work includes participation as a study therapist in psychedelic therapy research at Yale University and the University of Connecticut’s Health Center. Sara was the first Black therapist to provide MDMA-assisted psychotherapy in a clinical trial and continues to engage in ongoing advocacy work around health equity in psychedelic medicine.

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Jeffrey Guss, MD is a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and researcher with specializations in psychoanalytic therapy and the treatment of substance use disorders. He was Co-Principal Investigator and Director of Psychedelic Therapy Training for the NYU School of Medicine’s study on psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy in the treatment of cancer-related existential distress, which was published in Journal of Psychopharmacology, 2016. He currently is a study therapist in the NYU study on Psychedelic-Assisted therapy in the treatment of Alcoholism, a collaborator with Yale University’s study on psychedelic-assisted therapy for Major Depressive Disorder and a study therapist with the MAPS (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) study on treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder with Psychedelic-Assisted Psychotherapy. 

Dr. Guss is interested in the integration of psychedelic therapies with contemporary psychoanalytic theory and has published in Studies in Gender and Sexuality and Psychoanalysis, Culture and Society. He has published (with Elizabeth Nielson, PhD) a paper on “the influence of therapists’ first had experience with psychedelics on psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy research and therapist training” in The Journal of Psychedelic Studies, August, 2018. He is an Instructor and Mentor with the California Institute of Integral Studies’ Center for Psychedelic Therapies and Supervisor in NYU’s Fellowship in Addiction Psychiatry. 

Dr. Guss maintains a private practice in New York City.

Will Van Derveer, MD

Will Van Derveer, MD is Co-Founder of Integrative Psychiatry Institute and Integrative Psychiatry Centers. Dr. Van Derveer was co-investigator on a phase 2 MAPS study of Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy for treatment-resistant PTSD, and co-authored the publication of this study in 2018. He has also provided Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy in two MAPS training studies. An active provider of KAP at his clinic in Boulder, CO, he has been teaching others KAP therapy for several years. Dr. Van Derveer contributed a chapter on mescaline in the 2021 "Handbook of Medical Hallucinogens" (edited by Charles Grob and Jim Grigsby). He is co-host of the Higher Practice Podcast.

Dr. Van Derveer regards unresolved emotional trauma as the most significant under-recognized root cause of psychiatric symptoms in integrative psychiatry practice, along with gut issues, hormone imbalances, inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and other functional medicine challenges. He is trained in Somatic Experiencing, EMDR, Internal Family Systems, and other psychotherapy techniques. His current clinical passion is psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy, which he mentors interested doctors in providing. An avid meditator, he has been a meditation instructor since 2004.

For the past several years Dr. Van Derveer has taught psychiatrists and other psychiatric providers integrative psychiatry in a number of settings, including course directing the CU psychiatry residents’ course as well as with Scott Shannon and Janet Settle at the Psychiatry MasterClass.


Scott has been a student of consciousness since his honors thesis on that topic at the University of Arizona in the 1970s under the tutelage of Dr. Andrew Weil. Following medical school, Scott studied Jungian therapy and acupuncture while working as a primary care physician in a rural area for four years. Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy became a facet of his practice before this medicine was scheduled in 1985. He then completed a psychiatry residency at Columbia program in New York. Scott studied cross-cultural psychiatry and completed a child/adolescent psychiatry fellowship at the University of New Mexico.

In 2010 he founded Wholeness Center in Fort Collins. This innovative clinic provides cross-disciplinary evaluation and care for all mental health concerns. Scott serves as a site Principal Investigator and therapist for the Phase III trial of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy for PTSD sponsored by (MAPS). He has also published numerous articles about his research on (CBD) in mental health. Currently, Scott works extensively with psychedelic-assisted-psychotherapy. He lectures all over the world to professional groups interested in a deeper look at mental health issues, safer tools, and a paradigm-shifting perspective about transformative care.

Will Van Derveer, MD is co-founder of Integrative Psychiatry Institute (IPI), along with friend and colleague Keith Kurlander, MA. He co-created IPI as an expression of what he stands for. First, that anyone can heal, and second that we medical providers must embrace our own healing journeys in order to fully command our potency as healers.

Dr. Van Derveer spent the last 20 years innovating and testing a comprehensive approach to addressing psychiatric challenges which transcends the conventional model he learned in medical school at Vanderbilt University and residency at University of Colorado, while deeply engaging his own healing path.

He founded the Integrative Psychiatric Healing Center in in 2001 in Boulder, CO, where he currently practices. Dr. Van Derveer regards unresolved emotional trauma as the most significant root cause of psychiatric symptoms in integrative psychiatry practice, along with gut issues, hormone imbalances, inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and other functional medicine challenges. He is trained in Somatic Experiencing, EMDR, Internal Family Systems, and other psychotherapy techniques. His current clinical passion is psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy, which he mentors interested doctors in providing. An avid meditator, he has been a meditation instructor since 2004.

For the past several years Dr. Van Derveer has taught psychiatrists and other psychiatric providers integrative psychiatry in a number of settings, including course directing the CU psychiatry residents’ course as well as with Scott Shannon and Janet Settle at the Psychiatry MasterClass. In addition to his clinical work and teaching, he was co-investigator in 2016 a Phase II randomized clinical trial, sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). He continues to support this protocol, now in a Phase III clinical trial under break-through designation by FDA.

Dr. Van Derveer is a diplomate of the American Board of Integrative and Holistic Medicine (ABoIHM) since 2013, and he was board certified in the first wave of diplomates of the new American Board of Integrative Medicine (ABIM) in 2016.