Psychedelics, epilepsy, and seizures: a review
Ninon Freidel, Liliane Kreuder, Brenden Samuel Rabinovitch, Frank Yizhao Chen, Ryan S. Huang, Evan Lewis
Frontiers in Pharmacology January 12, 2024 DOI: 10.3389/fphar.2023.1326815
Summary
Psychedelics are proving clinically efficacious for various neurological and psychiatric disorders, yet all clinical trials exclude individuals with epilepsy or a history of seizures. This significant population, often overlooked in drug studies, faces exclusion without evidence that these compounds, many being alkaloids, induce seizures. Analysis of several cases suggests these substances, influencing behavior via neurotransmitter receptors, are safe in controlled clinical settings, even promoting seizure remission for some. This challenges current medicine, suggesting a broader role for psychedelic therapy.
Abstract
Psychedelic compounds have been utilized by humans for centuries for medicinal, religious, and tribal purposes. Clinical trial data starting from the early 2000s and continuing today indicates that psychedelics are a clinically efficacious treatment for a variety of neurological and psychiatric disorders. However, all clinical trials examining these substances have excluded any individual with a past or current history of seizures, leaving a large cohort of epilepsy and non-epilepsy chronic seizure disorder patients without anywhere to turn for psychedelic-assisted therapy. These exclusions were made despite any significant evidence that clinically supervised psychedelic use causes or exacerbates seizures in this population. To date, no clinical trial or preclinical seizure model has demonstrated that psychedelics induce seizures. This review highlights several cases of individuals experiencing seizures or seizure remission following psychedelic use, with the overall trend being that psychedelics are safe for use in a controlled, supervised clinical setting. We also suggest future research directions for this field.