MDMA-assisted therapy (MDMA-AT) is nearing regulatory approval, but the role of therapeutic touch within it remains understudied and raises ethical concerns about power dynamics. A review of existing literature on touch in psychotherapy found little empirical evidence specifically for MDMA-AT. To address this gap, the authors developed the Touch Outcomes Measurement Inventory (TOMI), a tool for assessing clients' perceptions of touch during MDMA-AT. The creation of TOMI is the main outcome, intended to help researchers and evaluators study touch's impact and inform evidence-based, ethical guidelines for its use in MDMA-AT and other psychedelic-assisted therapies.
MDMA is being tested as an adjunct to psychotherapy in controlled trials, including two completed Phase 3 trials, and could become a legally available medicine for MDMA-assisted therapy (MDMA-AT) within a few years. The treatment manual for MDMA-AT research considers touch an important part of therapy, but no empirical evaluation has examined how touch functions in MDMA-AT, and research on touch in psychotherapy generally is scarce. Concerns exist that touch combined with MDMA could intensify power imbalances or contribute to boundary crossings and unethical behavior.