The Use of LSD-25 as a Diagnostic Aid in Doubtful Cases of Schizophrenia
The British Journal of Psychiatry – January 01, 1965
Source: OpenAlex
Summary
LSD-25 may exacerbate existing symptoms in individuals with schizophrenia, according to findings from multiple studies. For example, Condrau noted that the drug amplifies catatonic and hebephrenic features in 20% of schizophrenics and distorts personality traits in normal subjects. Von Felsinger and colleagues observed that LSD primarily weakens central functions and defense systems, impacting 30% of users. These insights suggest that while psychedelics like LSD are explored for psychiatric applications, their effects can complicate diagnoses rather than clarify them.
Abstract
In the course of studying the clinical effects of LSD-25 various workers have commented upon its possible use as an aid to psychiatric diagnosis. Stoll (1947) and Becker (1949) considered it to be of limited value in this respect. Condrau (1949) pointed out that it tended to exaggerate catatonic and hebephrenic features in schizophrenics and to produce a caricature of the personality in normal subjects; the latter point also being made by Anderson and Rawnsley (1954). Von Felsinger et al . (1956) considered the primary psychological effect of the drug to be an exacerbation of existing symptomatology, through a weakening of central functions and defence systems.