Ibogaine therapy in the treatment of opiate dependency
Drugs and Alcohol Today December 2, 2010 Peer reviewed DOI: 10.5042/daat.2010.0724 via OpenAlex
Summary
Ibogaine therapy presents a promising alternative to traditional treatments for opiate addiction by combining its rapid addiction-arresting effects with psychoanalytical psychotherapy. This approach is considered safer than methadone and is gaining acceptance worldwide, with ibogaine recently becoming a prescription medication in New Zealand. The paper discusses how ibogaine and psychotherapy interact in treating opiate dependency and highlights their differences from other treatment methods.
Study at a glance
| Population | individuals with opiate addiction |
|---|---|
| Key finding | Ibogaine therapy combined with psychoanalytical psychotherapy offers a novel and potentially safer alternative for treating opiate addiction. |
Abstract
Ibogaine therapy offers a viable alternative to mainstream treatment for opiate addiction. The combination of the addiction‐arresting and fast‐acting properties of ibogaine, with the slow and thoughtful conversation of psychoanalytical psychotherapy is a novel approach to what still remains a difficult condition to overcome.Safer than methadone, ibogaine use is steadily increasing world‐wide, and is becoming a more accepted treatment for opiate addiction. This year it has become a prescription medication in New Zealand. Howard Lotsof, who discovered the anti‐addictive properties of ibogaine 47 years ago, and who died in January 2010, devoted his life to improving access to ibogaine treatment, and instigated the first ibogaine providers' conference in Mexico in 2009.This paper explores the use of ibogaine and psychoanalytic psychotherapy in the clinic for the treatment of opiate dependency, the relationships between the two approaches, and how they differ from other treatment modalities.