allegation of brain changes caused by LSD

[red22]

Figured I'd relay this. Before making this thread, I searched two technical overviews on LSD for these keywords and got no results.


Certainly LSD _can_ produce physical alterations to brain tissues - specifically,
vacuolization of nuclei of cortical neurons, and depletion and
fragmentation of the Nissl substance. (From experiments with rats given
large doses; incidentally, rabbits are much more sensitive than man, but
rats are somewhat less so).

A smaller subset of users experience far more severe complications than
flasbacks, including schizophrenic decomposition requiring semi-permanent
hospitalization, and at least one has had definite organic brain
dysfunctions (associated with neural squelae) lasting several months (this
last in a child).

Principles of Medical Pharmacology, Univ. of Toronto Press, 1985
Clinical Pharmacology: Basic Principles in Therapeutics, MacMillan, 1978
Fundamentals of Biochemical Pharmacology, Pergamon Press, 1971
Principles of Psychopharmacology, Academic Press, 1970
The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics, MacMillan, 1985
Ergot alkaloids and related compounds, Springer-Verlag, 1978


From: [email protected] (R.Fleming)
Newsgroups: rec.pyrotechnics
Subject: Re: Anarchist Cookbook (off topic, long)
Date: Fri, 05 Aug 1994 19:11:26 +1000
Message-ID: <[email protected]>


Source: http://yarchive.net/explosives/anarchists_cookbook.html

 

[sekio]

I think the levels of LSD you need to expose people to before cell damage occurs is like a thousandfold or more than an active psychedelic dose.

 

[serotonin2A]

LSD doesn't produce physical brain changes (other than synaptic changes connected to learning and memory). There are no known mechanisms for such an effect to occur.

 

[Dresden]

If you don't want your brain changed, then don't take LSD. Or MDMA. Or Prozac.

 

[red22]

No need for silly comments like that. I'm specifically asking about the vacuole and Nissl findings quoted. Sounds significant (but not necessarily significant in context, as sekio conveyed).

 

[serotonin2A]

The only similar study I could find was from an abstract in Federation Proceedings. I don't think the work was ever eventually published so it probably couldn't make it through peer review. The effect occured at 25 mg/kg LSD, which is an extremely high dose in rats. Rodents start to show behavioral effects of LSD at doses less than 0.05 mg/kg and the effects peak at about 0.2-0.4 mg/kg, so they gave the rats a massive overdose. For comparion purposes, a typical training dose for LSD drug discrimination studies in rats is 0.08 mg/kg. It's not suprising that they might have seen structural changes at very high doses because LSD is probably binding to all sorts of targets that it would never normally interact.

When people have taken massive overdoses of LSD (~200 mg) their capilaries start to fail and their organs shut down. So it appears that high doses of LSD can produce weird effects, but it probably has nothing to do with the specific pharmacology of LSD. You might see the same effect with a very high a dose of any ergot alkaloid.

 

[red22]

awesome post.

 

[red22]

Someone on Shroomery said 2Cs and DOx are known to cause free radical stress. Is that true?

 

[red22]

One of the most serious problems associated with these herbal and pharmaceutical drugs is their effect of hyperstimulating the serotonin concentrations through a variety of mechanisms to create neuronal destruction from an excess of serotonin, which then becomes oxidized. In this oxidized form, the serotonin is neurotoxic.

Gabriel Cousens. Spiritual Nutrition (2009).

I copied and pasted the whole thing into the following thread: The Damage Drugs Inflict On The Spiritual Body

I'm just putting it out there. I realize it doesn't have a citation.

I'll also add the following report from a Shroomery member:

LSD tends to destroy my visual cortex, short term memory, and energy for about a week (or more) after I use it. First I spend 2 days laying around and not doing anything productive. Then I spend the rest of the week not being able to remember things, not being able to adequately judge distances, seeing in 2D, doing work slowly, being dumb in social interactions, not performing well in sports, and in general sucking at everything.

I'm now working and studying a large load of courses and I can no longer afford these side effects. However, tripping is extremely fun and I still want to do it. Is there any way to avoid these side effects? - perhaps by taking certain substances before, during, or after the trip, or getting a certain amount of sleep at certain times? (I already try to get 8 hours). Any suggestions are welcome (not just about substances or sleep).

09/10/11 - PsychoKinesiS - https://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/15058411

 

[Atomic_Decay]

I am no expert at all in this area but do try and read new research papers on LSD - especially those using advanced imaging technology. I don’t think I’ve seen a paper demonstrating permanent neuroplastic changes resulting from LSD use.

The likely connection seems to be any impact LSD might have on Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor which remains a subject of research.

This meta-analysis seems to cover the most current research into psychedelics and neuroplasticity.

Frontiers | Psychedelics and Neuroplasticity: A Systematic Review Unraveling the Biological Underpinnings of Psychedelics

Clinical studies suggest the therapeutic potential of psychedelics, including ayahuasca, DMT, psilocybin, and LSD, in stress-related disorders. These substan...

www.frontiersin.org