Why isn't mescaline used in psychedelic psychotherapy research?

[<SpaceHead>]

All of the recent studies in the field of psychedelic psychotherapy use LSD or Psilocybin. Why isn't mescaline used? It seems like it would be perfect. It's certainly much less mind warping than LSD or psilocybin, and reports of bad trips on it are extremely rare. Seems like a safer option, but why isn't it used?

 

[zn13bt]

Because it's much less potent than LSD and psilocybin, and hence much more expensive per dose.

 

[blazR]

^ Indeed

 

[BruceLeeSwag]

All of the recent studies in the field of psychedelic psychotherapy use LSD or Psilocybin. Why isn't mescaline used? It seems like it would be perfect. It's certainly much less mind warping than LSD or psilocybin, and reports of bad trips on it are extremely rare. Seems like a safer option, but why isn't it used?

probably because of the lesser mind bending effect of it, it is less valuable as a medicine.

 

[*dharmabum*]

Because it's much less potent than LSD and psilocybin, and hence much more expensive per dose.

Surely this isn't that big a deal given that these tend to be fairly small scale studies? I can sort of see BruceLeeSwag's point but given the success people had with MDMA before its legislation I would have thought Mescaline would be a great candidate for research.

 

[jackie jones]

Good question...

 

[zn13bt]

Well you would need about ten to twenty times the amount of mescaline as you would need psilocybin for the same number of doses, so unless I'm missing something it's going to cost ten to twenty times as much to get it synthed, isn't it?

MDMA is a special case since its effect profile is very different from the classic psychedelics.

 

[Dondante]

All of the recent studies in the field of psychedelic psychotherapy use LSD or Psilocybin. Why isn't mescaline used? It seems like it would be perfect. It's certainly much less mind warping than LSD or psilocybin, and reports of bad trips on it are extremely rare. Seems like a safer option, but why isn't it used?

...because it lasts 12-16 hours. You'd have to keep people in the hospital overnight. Same with LSD.

 

[Dondante]

Well you would need about ten to twenty times the amount of mescaline as you would need psilocybin for the same number of doses, so unless I'm missing something it's going to cost ten to twenty times as much to get it synthed, isn't it?

True, but the expense of the drug is trivial compared with the expense of paying a guide and covering costs of an overnight hospital stay (orders of magnitude difference).

 

[freedstar]

I doubt the cost of Mescaline is holding back research 8)

There's so few studies actually taking place that it all probably comes down to personal preference of the people who put these things into action. Maybe they find that Mushrooms/LSD trigger a greater response in people?

 

[shishigami]

Isn't there much greater nausea reported with Mescaline (even synthetic) that could be very unattractive in psychotherapy research for the inexperienced.

 

[any major dude]

I seriously doubt cost is a factor. I'm pretty sure the main issue is going to be duration. The two main reasons psilocybin is the most frequently used are the relatively short duration and the word didn't have the same cultural baggage as LSD. I'd guess mescaline may have a little more cultural baggage than psilocybin just by virtue if it being easier to pronounce, but mostly the holdup is going to be the way 12-16hr trips are going to monopolize the researchers time. You certainly don't want to be switching sitters midway through the session, and 8 hrs is a long time to sit & watch someone trip, let alone 1.5-2x that.

 

[Ismene]

"The secret cheif" (a psychotherapist back in the 70s) used to use mescaline but he found you needed massive doses to get anything like the effect of psilocybin or LSD. I think LSD and particularly psilocybin are far more psychedelic than mescaline, mescaline is by far the gentlest psychedelic and I don't believe it's much good for diving into yourself emotionally. It's more like MDMA than psilocybin.

I can't remember who it was but someone on the board disagrees with this and was insistent that mescaline is just as psychedelic as mushrooms.

 

[<SpaceHead>]

mescaline lasts maybe 8-10 hours in my experience, usualy shorter than LSD. And yea I highly doubt that cost is a factor, I'm sure just getting through all the red tape to do the projects in the first place costs many times more than a dose of mescaline. It does cause nausea though even in the pure synthetic form. And it is less mind warping for sure, but certainly still psychedelic. I was thinking the less mind warping aspect would be a plus, I would think it would maybe help people stay more grounded to concentrate on personal issues rather than being distracted by surreal states of mind. Native americans have used it therapudicaly for thousands of years to great effect. It also seems to have an extremely low rate of bad trips and negative reactions which i would think would be a huge plus in the therapudic setting.

 

[gymstud]

Do they ever use 2c family in therapy

 

[daytryptr]

Do they ever use 2c family in therapy

I believe some therapists in germany used 2c-d, but other than that i've not read/heard of any other usage of the 2c-x's in therapy.

 

[Ismene]

Native americans have used it therapudicaly for thousands of years to great effect.

I don't think the native americans were using it that long spacehead, a couple of mexican tribes have used it for a long time but it only moved north to the american indians about 100 years ago.

 

[<SpaceHead>]

I wasnt aware it was such a recent development. Do you think psilocybin mushrooms have a longer history of use?

 

[atara]

I seriously doubt cost is a factor. I'm pretty sure the main issue is going to be duration. The two main reasons psilocybin is the most frequently used are the relatively short duration and the word didn't have the same cultural baggage as LSD. I'd guess mescaline may have a little more cultural baggage than psilocybin just by virtue if it being easier to pronounce, but mostly the holdup is going to be the way 12-16hr trips are going to monopolize the researchers time. You certainly don't want to be switching sitters midway through the session, and 8 hrs is a long time to sit & watch someone trip, let alone 1.5-2x that.

You've got half of it. The other big one is mescaline's body load. No researcher wants to deal with twenty volunteers all puking their guts out and being handed something by some dude in a lab coat and subsequently feeling sick is definitely not a good set and setting for a psychotherapy session. The same thing happens with ayahuasca. People who don't know what they're taking get sick and think they're going to die.

4-HO-DET has been used in psychotherapy research because it doesn't last as long as psilocin. Some of the other psilocin series may be similarly applicable.

The NBOMe's may actually prove useful because they don't last long and they feel nice.

 

[2c-goinsane]

"The potential psychotherapeutic applications of this chemical were explored by Myron Stolaroff who found it a very promising substance in his experiments." talking about 2c-t-21 found this on wiki i thought was interesting, i think another BL member mentioned it recently somewhere as well.