Can psychedelic-assisted therapy essentially cure mental health ailments?

Jon Dalton might not be the guy you first think of when you think “psychedelics.”

“I did almost two-and-a-half decades in the [Navy] SEAL Teams, with [a] component of that pre-9/11, doing counter narcotics and drug missions in South America,” he said.

“So, I saw the evil that drugs can do: drug trade, ‘narco terrorists,’ cartels etc.”

It might then seem surprising that Dalton is an advocate for psychedelic-assisted therapies. He’s the co-founder, president and legislative policy advisor for the Nevada Coalition for Psychedelic Medicines, a Nevada-based think tank focused on education and advocacy of the therapeutic potential of psychedelics in the state.

Dalton’s not just the president; he also has personal experience. After his service with the Navy SEALS, he traveled to Mexico for psychedelic-assisted treatment, something that at the time, was illegal in the United States.

“Being somebody that’s traditionally a rule follower, I understood that there was an underground here where you could do something like that. That didn’t appeal to me. And so, I eventually went down there [to] engage in a legal psychedelic medicine journey,” he said.

That journey, like many who have taken psychedelics, changed Dalton’s life. By undergoing his own psychedelic-assisted therapy, he realized the potential it can have for first-responders: primarily military personnel, but also police officers, paramedics and firefighters.

“I found it effective to the point that it was, in fact, one of [the] most profound experiences without a doubt,” he said. “I recognized that this is a healing modality that veterans and first responders all over the country, and especially the state of Nevada need to need to have access to.”

“About 80% of patients with cancer and clinically significant depression and anxiety showed improvements up to six months after a high dose of psilocybin.”

Dr. Albert Garcia-Romeu, Johns Hopkins Medicine

What are psychedelics and psychedelic-assisted therapy?

You might be familiar with the psychedelics psilocybin (Magic mushrooms), acid (LSD) or ecstacy (MDMA). They are defined as substances, both naturally-occurring and synthetic, that cause altered mental states of being. The effects, known as “trips,” vary, but generally enhance visual sensations and open up new perspectives of thinking. Effects from these experiences can help increase the brain’s neuroplasticity, which is the process of essentially rewiring the nervous systems to respond differently to external triggers, emotions and stimuli.

That’s because psychedelics can give people a chance to revisit harmful experiences and painful memories from a different – less anxious – state of mind, according to Kate Cotter, Executive Director of the Nevada Coalition for Psychedelic Medicines.

“In the process of memory re-consolidation, there is a mismatch to what you normally might feel while you’re working with the memory,” she said. “Not to say it’s all roses and rainbows, but because of the physiological reduction in anxiety in the process of re-consolidating the memory, it allows it to get put back in a different place, potentially with less fear attached.”

It’s kind of like the Disney Pixar movie, Inside Out, just in reverse. In one scene, a core happy memory is touched by a sadness character, which changes the feeling of that memory.

“Good going, sadness. Now when Riley thinks of that moment with Dad, she’s going to feel sad,” one character said.

Cotter said memory re-consolidation and re-framing of traumatic memories is what psychedelic-assisted therapy can provide people experiencing PTSD, depression, addiction or other mental health issues.

“If it’s the most horrific experience of your life, there’s never going to be a happy thing about it. But if there’s a way to find some kind of redemptive element, where you can think, ‘Look how strong I am that I survived that,’ ‘Look how resilient I am,’ ‘Look what I learned from that,’ ‘Look how I can maybe help other people with this,’ that is key to the circuitry,” she said.

However, it’s not as simple as taking a magic mushroom-laden chocolate bar and going on your way. Dr. Albert Garcia-Romeu studies the effectiveness of psychedelics on addiction at Johns Hopkins Medicine.

“It’s important that people know these [psychedelics] are not a magic bullet, they’re not going to fix everyone’s problems, they’re not going to work for everyone,” he said.

It’s also not for everyone. Dr. Garcia-Romeu said this treatment isn’t ideal for those with bipolar mood disorder or those with certain heart conditions. It might be tempting to conjure up images of old hippie rockers dropping LSD at a concert, but that’s not who the treatment is for nor how it works.

“The drug sessions themselves typically take place in a living room like environment. They usually last about eight hours. We are typically doing this work with a couple of facilitators who are present throughout the dosing sessions, in the preparation,” he said. “We asked participants to lie down on a couch, listen to a program of music, and to focus their attention inward.”

After a session, participants are able to process thoughts and emotions that popped up during the experience with trained professionals. This set-and-setting approach is a critical component of helping participants manage challenging thought patterns. These sessions, even if done only once, have shown significant potential for treating mental health disorders.

“We found that about 80% of patients with cancer and clinically significant depression and anxiety showed improvements up to six months after a high dose of psilocybin,” Dr. Garcia-Romeu said.

The potential and the pitfalls

Dr. Alan Davis studies the effectiveness of talk therapy plus psychedelic-assisted therapy on depression, compared to talk therapy without psychedelics at the Ohio State University. He found those who had psychedelic-assisted therapy reported significantly lower depressive symptoms.

“Approximately one-half of the participants were in complete remission from depression at one week, and four weeks after the treatment was completed,” he said.

The results lasted, too. Davis said three-quarters of participants reported at least a 50% reduction in depression symptoms, and one-half of them were still in complete remission from depression – up to one year after the psychedelic treatment.

Psychedelics are also showing potential in the treatment of addiction, which could be a game changer for the nation’s opioid crisis. Dr. Garcia-Romeu pointed to a study from the 1970s showing that those with opioid dependence saw four times greater abstinence after a single high-dose LSD treatment.

“We also have growing evidence looking at psilocybin for treating addictions, including alcohol and tobacco, as well as work looking at the use of psychedelics and psilocybin in existential distress,” he said.

With all the evidence showing the therapeutic potential of psychedelics, there are still hurdles. There’s a decades-long stigma associated with their use, and the federal government still considers them Schedule I drugs, which is defined defines as drugs with “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

But Dr. Garcia-Romeu said the science isn’t that cut-and-dry.

“These drugs are not typically thought of as addictive. The classic psychedelics do not create a withdrawal syndrome,” he said. “But these drugs can produce psychological dependence, and people can and do abuse them.”

Next Steps

Due to psychedelics’ classification as a Schedule I drug, Dr. Alan Davis said there just hasn’t been the large-scale support needed to develop a body of research.

“The reason the studies have been so small is because there’s been absolutely almost no governmental support for the science for the better part of the last three decades. Because of that, we have had to do these studies on a razor-thin budget, often pulling together volunteer hours from investigators and really trying to pull in private donors and the public to help fund some of this work,” he said.

Lack of funding for studies means a lack of data for policy makers. That’s something the Nevada Legislature tried to fix this summer, by passing SB242, which created the Psychedelic Medicines Working Group.

Jon Dalton, the former Navy SEAL turned psychedelics advocate, said the goal of the working group is to objectively look at the topic and help fill in the gaps of knowledge ahead of the 2025 session.

“Bring in a lot of data, a lot of science, a lot of facts on psychedelic medicine: its benefits, its limitations, its strengths and weaknesses, who it might be good for, who it might not be good for, the populations that it can help, which is going to be a lot, how can this benefit Nevadans,” he said.

Dalton is a big believer in the potential psychedelic medicines can have on many groups, but he’s particularly bullish on it’s ability at solving one major bipartisan issue: treating post-traumatic stress disorder in the nation’s veterans.

“PTSD is one of those things that people struggle with their entire lives. And so, this can make it where that memory becomes simply less relevant, and that memory doesn’t have that same level of pain, anguish, fear, sadness, whatever associated with it, and they can resume a normal quality of life,” he said.

Dalton said he doesn’t want to see psychedelic access in Nevada to mirror that of the state’s cannabis industry. Rather than a primarily recreational market, he said psychedelic-assisted treatment should be easily available for those who medically need it and have the right intentions.

“This is really 90-95% medical use desired, to attack the mental health issue. We don’t advocate for a dispensary model,” he said.

The working group will provide updates to the lawmakers and the governor next year, ahead of the 2025 legislative session. Dalton is hopeful the data provided from this group can give lawmakers what they need to develop a program that could potentially help thousands of people across the state.

“This type of medicine, this type of therapy, has the potential to actually cure PTSD,” he said.