LSD Finds New Respectability

"Farfrom being fringe medical research, trials of LSD were once alegitimate branch of psychiatric research," explains Erika Dyck, adoctoral researcher in the Department of History at McMaster. "LSDproduced a "model psychosis," meaning people who took the drugexhibited symptoms of illnesses such as schizophrenia. Doctors usedthis as a new method for studying mental illness."

In a recentissue of the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, Dyck traces the history ofLSD—and its eventual withdrawal from medical research. LSD, ord-lysergic acid diethylamide, first appeared in scientific literaturein 1943. For nearly a decade, it gave psychiatrists insight into theexperi-ences of schizophrenic patients and showed potential as a curefor alcoholism.

In the 1960s, as the media increasinglyassociated the drug with love-ins, anti-war demonstrations and thecounterculture, governments intervened to criminalize LSD, restrictingand then terminating medical research into its potential therapeuticeffects.

Now, therapeutic uses of psychedelic drugs areresurfacing. Research groups in the United States are currentlyexamining the usefulness of MDMA, or "ecstasy," in treating pain inmedical conditions such as Parkinson's disease and cancer.

Thismakes Dyck optimistic that LSD may become a valid area of researchagain. "Many illegal drugs are used in medical settings. Scientists whostudied LSD made important contributions to psychiatry, and found ithelped many people cope with mental illness."

Dyck discoveredanother interesting fact while researching LSD: The term "psychedelic",it turns out, was a Canadian invention – coined in Weyburn, Sask. inthe 1950s.

The paper is available online at www.cpa-apc.org/Publications/Archives/CJP/2005/june/InRevDyck.asp.

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