All things drugs and alcohol: MDMA needs to be studied, not demonised
MDMA, or ...: MDMA needs to be studied, not demonised MDMA, or as it's better known, ecstasy, is one of the most heavily regulated drugs wor...
Sunday, October 16, 2016
MDMA needs to be studied, not demonised
MDMA, or as it's better known, ecstasy, is one of the most heavily regulated drugs worldwide.
But leading neuroscientists have just published a commentary calling for more research into the substance, claiming that understanding how it works could hold the key to new therapeutic compounds and treatments for psychological conditions such as PTSD.
This isn't the first time that researchers have shown that MDMA could have potential in treating psychiatric disorders - a trial of 12 people with PTSD, or post-traumatic stress disorder, showed that, in conjunction with counselling, the compound could treat the condition without any ill side effects.
Six years later, 11 of them hadn't had any PTSD symptoms return, and none had started abusing drugs (the 12th member of the original study wasn't available for the follow-up).
Another study in 1998 showed that one session of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy was as beneficial as a decade of regular talking therapy.
MDMA's therapeutic effect was often rapid, happening over the course of hours or only a few short therapeutic sessions.
The benefits appear to come from the fact that MDMA triggers electrochemical messaging in the brain that increases feeling of connection and empathy - which is why scientists class the drug as an "empathogen".
But on a neurological level, researchers still don't really understand how it works - and although initial brain scans have provided insight into which regions of the brain are involved in the process, there's still more to find out.
Which is why the scientists are calling for approval to use all the available tools of modern basic and clinical neuroscience research to map MDMA’s mechanism of action in the brain.
Right now, MDMA is classed as a schedule I drug in the US, alongside drugs such as heroin - and that means they're extremely hard for researchers to get ethics approval and funding to study.
To be clear, the researchers openly acknowledge that the drug can be dangerous in large doses, and shouldn't be used recreationally. But irrational barriers to its study based on poor understanding of its actions need to be minimised so that appropriate clinical studies can be performed.
Drugs like MDMA should be the object of rigorous scientific study, and should not necessarily be demonised.
http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-say-mdma-needs-to-be-studied-not-outlawed
MDMA, or as it's better known, ecstasy, is one of the most heavily regulated drugs worldwide.But leading neuroscientists have just published a commentary calling for more research into the substance, claiming that understanding how it works could hold the key to new therapeutic compounds and treatments for psychological conditions such as PTSD.
This isn't the first time that researchers have shown that MDMA could have potential in treating psychiatric disorders - a trial of 12 people with PTSD, or post-traumatic stress disorder, showed that, in conjunction with counselling, the compound could treat the condition without any ill side effects.
Six years later, 11 of them hadn't had any PTSD symptoms return, and none had started abusing drugs (the 12th member of the original study wasn't available for the follow-up).
Another study in 1998 showed that one session of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy was as beneficial as a decade of regular talking therapy.
MDMA's therapeutic effect was often rapid, happening over the course of hours or only a few short therapeutic sessions.
The benefits appear to come from the fact that MDMA triggers electrochemical messaging in the brain that increases feeling of connection and empathy - which is why scientists class the drug as an "empathogen".
But on a neurological level, researchers still don't really understand how it works - and although initial brain scans have provided insight into which regions of the brain are involved in the process, there's still more to find out.
Which is why the scientists are calling for approval to use all the available tools of modern basic and clinical neuroscience research to map MDMA’s mechanism of action in the brain.
Right now, MDMA is classed as a schedule I drug in the US, alongside drugs such as heroin - and that means they're extremely hard for researchers to get ethics approval and funding to study.
To be clear, the researchers openly acknowledge that the drug can be dangerous in large doses, and shouldn't be used recreationally. But irrational barriers to its study based on poor understanding of its actions need to be minimised so that appropriate clinical studies can be performed.
Drugs like MDMA should be the object of rigorous scientific study, and should not necessarily be demonised.
http://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-say-mdma-needs-to-be-studied-not-outlawed
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