Psychedelics in palliative care
We don’t talk about death very often. We rarely even think about it. We may know vaguely what palliative care means but until someone close to us is dying we usually don’t need or want to know more.
This is how it is in our culture. Death isn’t exactly a topic for a dinner conversation.
Speaking of death, we are usually quite sure about just one thing. We want to die at home. And then most of us pass away in the hospital. Fortunately, things are getting better.
If you are lucky there is a hospice nearby with palliative doctors and nurses who are ready to help you to die in peace. What does that mean? Mainly that you die without unnecessary physical suffering. Current palliative care is excellent in relieving physical pain.
Unfortunately, it’s different when it comes to psychical suffering. The fact is a third of palliative patients and two-fifths of oncologic patients suffer from existential distress. What does that mean? When we talk about existential distress, we talk about anxiety, depression, and/or adjustment disorder.
It’s not a surprise considering we talk about people facing the fact they have a life-threatening disease or they are going to die soon.
The bad news is that the current options for treating existential distress are very limited. Antidepressants don’t work. Psychotherapy can help slightly but it’s expensive and time-consuming.
The good news is that there is ongoing research that has been showing that psychedelics might be of help. There is still lots of work that have to be done but as famous palliative doctor Ira Byock said, “Despite the controversial history of psychedelic medications, palliative specialists (…) have a duty to explore these hopeful, potentially life-preserving treatments.”
Now is the moment when I want to share something with you. It’s a brand new website you can find at www.psypal.org/en/. It aims to educate Czech palliative specialists about current research on psychedelics in palliative care and its promising results.
Who is behind this website? It’s me and palliative psychologist Honza Soukup whom I met thanks to our membership in the Czech psychedelic society. Since February we’ve been trying to create an informal group connecting palliative people. Psypal.org is an important step we did to make important information from this field public.
It’s just a beginning but I hope you find it interesting anyway. And please if you know somebody working in palliative care or related field, share our website with him or her. Thank you.
