Psychedelic DMT reduces symptoms of depression after just one dose

A single dose of the psychedelic drug dimethyltryptamine (DMT) had a rapid and lasting effect on depressive symptoms in a small study.

DMT – a fast-acting and extremely powerful psychedelic found in many plants around the world – is subject to the strictest international controls, with the UN considering it a substance with a high potential for abuse and no recognized medical use.

But a wave of observational research suggests that DMT and other psychedelics could help people with serious mental disorders, especially who do not respond to conventional treatment.

In a recent study David Erritzoe at Imperial College London and his colleagues studied 34 people who had experienced moderate to severe depression for an average of 10 years and who had tried at least two conventional medicines or psychotherapies without success.

In addition to psychotherapeutic support, half of the participants were given a large 21.5 microgram dose of DMT intravenously over 10 minutes, while the rest received a placebo infusion.

All participants completed a depression assessment questionnaire at the beginning of the study. Two weeks after the infusions, the DMT group experienced an average decrease in depression scores of 7.4 points more than the placebo group. This was consistently maintained for three months and in some participants for up to six months.

In another part of the study, all participants had a free dose of DMT, either as a second dose or, for the placebo group, the first, along with therapist support. This did not significantly improve results after the first dose, suggesting that one treatment is sufficient for a sustained effect.

In terms of safety, side effects were mild, with some participants reporting temporary anxiety, nausea, and pain at the infusion site.

“We have shown that a single experience of DMT, lasting only about 25 minutes, can be safe, well tolerated, and associated with significant improvement in depression, which appears to persist after the acute psychedelic state,” says Erritzoe. “What is promising is how comparable these early signals appear to the results seen in studies with longer-acting psychedelics such as psilocybin.” A shorter psychedelic experience should reduce treatment costs, he says.

But the nature of psychedelic use means that people can usually guess whether or not they are in the placebo group, so the results may reflect both the effects of DMT and the participants’ expectations.

The researchers noted that the intensity of the mystical-type experiences that the DMT group reported about 25 minutes after the drug was administered was associated with their degree of therapeutic improvement. “The more someone felt a sense of oneness; a profoundly positive emotional shift; a change in how they experienced time and space; and something so profound that it was hard to put into words, the more benefit they tended to report afterward,” says a team member Tomas Barbaraalso at Imperial.

Although it’s not exactly clear how psychedelics like DMT can be beneficial for treating depression, research suggests that their use provides a temporary window of neuroplasticity where the brain can form new connections, or that they can dampen inflammation associated with poor mental health.

Rick Strassman — a pioneer in psychedelic research — says he’s building on those results previous studies in which participants were told what drug they were taking. However, he still stresses the importance of proceeding with caution. “While the DMT experience is shorter than psilocybin and LSD, it can be considerably more disorienting than longer-acting psychedelics and requires careful preparation, monitoring and follow-up.”

Erritzoe and his team say the results should help in testing a modified form called DMT HLP004 for anxiety from Helus Pharma. Meanwhile, a similar molecule, called 5-MeO-DMT, is in more advanced stages of depression testing. For example, promising results from Atai Beckley in New York mean that development of its drug-resistant depression candidate may be accelerated, making it likely to be approved in the US.

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