Abstract:
To this day, behavioral and pharmacological treatments for smoking and alcohol addiction display modest success rates, and treatment options are limited. Preliminary studies in animal and human models suggest that psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide, ibogaine, and 18-MC exhibit antiaddictive properties. Therefore, I conducted a systematic review of the literature to assess effectiveness of these psychedelics and guide future preliminary research. Clinical trials and review-based papers assessing these antiaddictive properties were published in peer-reviewed journals were evaluated.
Searches were performed through the PubMed database. Sources were limited to English with full publication access, and required to contain quantitative data. Searches initially found 147 studies. Of these studies, 13 were pertinent to addiction treatment and met the established criteria. The reviewed studies suggest these drugs exhibit beneficial effects for tobacco, alcohol, opioid, and cocaine addiction. Primarily, 18-Mc and ibogaine suggest beneficial effects for opioid and cocaine dependence while psilocybin suggests beneficial effects for the treatment of alcohol and tobacco dependence. There was minimal evidence suggesting lysergic acid diethylamide mitigates alcohol addiction. In conclusion, psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide, ibogaine, and 18-MC may be potential tools for drug abuse therapy. Additional studies on these hallucinogens are necessary to understand the mechanism behind this phenomena and the extent of these hallucinogen’s clinical application.