Psilocybin demonstrated to help nine with obsessive behavior (OCD)

This is a follow-up story on the University of Arizona psilocybin study from the Arizona Daliy Star.

In a small-scale preliminary study, a UA psychiatrist has found that psilocybin, the active agent in psychedelic mushrooms, is effective in relieving the symptoms of people who suffer from severe obsessive compulsive disorder.

Dr. Francisco A. Moreno and his colleagues conducted the first FDA-approved clinical study of psilocybin since it was outlawed in 1970. The results are published in the latest edition of the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. Moreno cautions that the study was simply to test the safety of administering psilocybin to OCD patients. The effectiveness of the drug is still in question until a larger controlled study can be conducted.

Still, in each of the nine patients in the study, psilocybin completely removed OCD symptoms for a period of generally four to 24 hours, with some patients remaining symptom-free for days.