Dr. Athanassios Kafkalides was a Greek neuropsychiatrist. He was born in 1919 and he died in 1989 while in Athens. He graduated in medicine from the University of Athens and took post-graduate courses in neurology, experimental neurophysiology, neurosurgery and psychiatry at the Prince of Wales General Hospital, the Institute of Neurology in London, the Serafimer Lazarettet and the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, and the Eginition Hospital in Athens. From 1960 to 1987 he devoted a great deal of time to clinical research into the field of psychedelic psychotherapy, using drugs such as LSD, [1] [2] [3] psilocybin and ketamine. At the IV World Congress of Psychiatry in Madrid, in 1966, he delivered a paper on the subject of intrauterine life, pioneering the field of pre- and perinatal psychology. [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] He delivered further papers on intrauterine experiences and their repercussions [2] at the VI International Congress of Psychotherapy (Wiesbaden, 1967), the Panhellenic Congress of Psychiatry in Salonica (1972), Athens (in 1975), and at the Congress of Preventive Psychiatry (Athens, 1979).
He was invited to Cyprus by the Pancypriot Society of Mental Health to give a series of lectures on experiences during intrauterine life and their effects on everyday life [1980]. In 1983-1984 he was invited to Australia, where he gave a series of lectures on his clinical research with ketamine. He has published several papers on LSD and its psychotherapeutic application in Annales Medico-psychologiques de Paris (1963), [1] in Exerpta Medica (1968), [2] and in Proceedings of the IV World Congress of Psychiatry, Madrid (1966).
His two major works, The Knowledge of the Womb, [11] [12] [13] and The Power of the Womb, were first published in Greece in 1980 and 1987.
His work on prenatal and perinatal psychology resonates with the work of his contemporaries like Stanislav Grof, who arrived at similar conclusions [14] [15] regarding how early fetal and neonatal experiences affect the human psyche and how psychedelic psychotherapy can help access those states.
Lysergic acid diethylamide, commonly known as LSD, and known colloquially as acid, is a potent psychedelic drug. Effects typically include intensified thoughts, emotions, and sensory perception. At sufficiently high dosages LSD manifests primarily mental, visual, and auditory hallucinations. Dilated pupils, increased blood pressure, and increased body temperature are typical. Effects typically begin within half an hour and can last for up to 20 hours. LSD is also capable of causing mystical experiences and ego dissolution. It is used mainly as a recreational drug or for spiritual reasons. LSD is both the prototypical psychedelic and one of the "classical" psychedelics, being the psychedelic with the greatest scientific and cultural significance. LSD is synthesized as a solid compound, typically in the form of a powder or a crystalline material. This solid LSD is then dissolved in a liquid solvent, such as ethanol or distilled water, to create a solution. The liquid serves as a carrier for the LSD, allowing for accurate dosage and administration onto small pieces of blotter paper called tabs. LSD is typically either swallowed or held under the tongue.
Psychotherapy is the use of psychological methods, particularly when based on regular personal interaction, to help a person change behavior, increase happiness, and overcome problems. Psychotherapy aims to improve an individual's well-being and mental health, to resolve or mitigate troublesome behaviors, beliefs, compulsions, thoughts, or emotions, and to improve relationships and social skills. Numerous types of psychotherapy have been designed either for individual adults, families, or children and adolescents. Certain types of psychotherapy are considered evidence-based for treating some diagnosed mental disorders; other types have been criticized as pseudoscience.
Psychedelia usually refers to a style or aesthetic that is resembled in the psychedelic subculture of the 1960s and the psychedelic experience produced by certain psychoactive substances. This includes psychedelic art, psychedelic music and style of dress during that era. This was primarily generated by people who used psychedelic drugs such as LSD, mescaline and psilocybin and also non-users who were participants and aficionados of this subculture. Psychedelic art and music typically recreate or reflect the experience of altered consciousness. Psychedelic art uses highly distorted, surreal visuals, bright colors and full spectrums and animation to evoke, convey, or enhance the psychedelic experience. Psychedelic music uses distorted electric guitar, Indian music elements such as the sitar, tabla, electronic effects, sound effects and reverb, and elaborate studio effects, such as playing tapes backwards or panning the music from one side to another.
Psychedelics are a subclass of hallucinogenic drugs whose primary effect is to trigger non-ordinary mental states and an apparent expansion of consciousness. Also referred to as classic hallucinogens or serotonergic hallucinogens, the term psychedelic is sometimes used more broadly to include various types of hallucinogens, such as those which are atypical or adjacent to psychedelia like salvia and MDMA, respectively. This article makes use of the narrower classical definition of psychedelics. Classic psychedelics generally cause specific psychological, visual, and auditory changes, and oftentimes a substantially altered state of consciousness. They have had the largest influence on science and culture, and include mescaline, LSD, psilocybin, and DMT.
A bad trip is an acute adverse psychological reaction to classic hallucinogens. With proper screening, preparation, and support in a regulated setting these are usually benign. A bad trip on psilocybin, for instance, often features intense anxiety, confusion, and agitation, or even psychotic episodes. They manifest as a range of feelings, such as anxiety, paranoia, the unshakeable sense of one's inevitable and imminent personal demise or states of unrelieved terror that they believe will persist after the substance's effects have worn off. As of 2011, exact data on the frequency of bad trips are not available.
Stanislav "Stan" Grof is a Czech-born psychiatrist who has been living in the United States since the 1960s. Grof is one of the principal developers of transpersonal psychology and research into the use of non-ordinary states of consciousness for purposes of psychological healing, deep self-exploration, and obtaining growth and insights into the human psyche. In 1993, Grof received an Honorary Award from the Association for Transpersonal Psychology (ATP) for major contributions to and development of the field of transpersonal psychology, given at the occasion of the 25th Anniversary Convocation held in Asilomar, California. He also received the VISION 97 award granted by the Foundation of Dagmar and Václav Havel in Prague on October 5, 2007. In 2010, he received the Thomas R. Verny Award from the Association for Pre- and Perinatal Psychology and Health (APPPAH). On the other hand, Grof has been criticized by the skeptic group Český klub skeptiků Sisyfos in the Czech Republic for furthering what they view as nonscientific psychology too far outside the bounds of the materialistic philosophical underpinnings of modern science. He is the only person to have been awarded the anti-prize Erratic Boulder Award twice in that country. Grof was married to psychologist Brigitte Grof in 2014.
Prenatal psychology can be seen as a part of developmental psychology, although historically it was developed in the heterogenous field of psychoanalysis. Its scope is the description and explanation of experience and behaviour of the individual before birth and postnatal consequences as well. In so far as the actual birth process is involved one can consider this perinatal psychology. Pre- and perinatal aspects are often discussed together.
Psychedelic therapy refers to the proposed use of psychedelic drugs, such as psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, and ayahuasca, to treat mental disorders. As of 2021, psychedelic drugs are controlled substances in most countries and psychedelic therapy is not legally available outside clinical trials, with some exceptions.
Set and setting, when referring to a psychedelic drug experience or the use of other psychoactive substances, means one's mindset and the physical and social environment in which the user has the experience. Set and setting are factors that can condition the effects of psychoactive substances: "Set" refers to the mental state a person brings to the experience, like thoughts, mood and expectations; "setting" to the physical and social environment. This is especially relevant for psychedelic experiences in either a therapeutic or recreational context.
Louis Jolyon West was an American psychiatrist involved in the public sphere. In 1954, at the age of 29 and with no previous post-residency fellowship or tenure-track appointment, he became a full professor and chair of psychiatry at the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. From 1969 to 1989, he served as chair of psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Medicine and the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute.
Hallucinogen persisting perception disorder (HPPD) is a non-psychotic disorder in which a person experiences apparent lasting or persistent visual hallucinations or perceptual distortions after a previous use of drugs, including but not limited to psychedelics, dissociatives, entactogens, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), and SSRIs. Despite being designated as a hallucinogen-specific disorder, the specific contributory role of psychedelic drugs is unknown.
Ego death is a "complete loss of subjective self-identity". The term is used in various intertwined contexts, with related meanings. Jungian psychology uses the synonymous term psychic death, referring to a fundamental transformation of the psyche. In death and rebirth mythology, ego death is a phase of self-surrender and transition, as described by Joseph Campbell in his research on the mythology of the Hero's Journey. It is a recurrent theme in world mythology and is also used as a metaphor in some strands of contemporary western thinking.
Walter Norman Pahnke was a minister, physician, and psychiatrist most famous for the "Good Friday Experiment", also referred to as the Marsh Chapel Experiment or the "Miracle of Marsh Chapel".
Frank Lake was a British psychiatrist and one of the pioneers of pastoral counselling in the United Kingdom. In 1962, he founded the Clinical Theology Association with the primary aim to make clergy more effective as listeners in understanding and accepting the psychological origins of their parishioners’ personal difficulties. However, the training in pastoral counselling, which he began in 1958, eventually enlisted professional and lay people in various fields from various denominations. Many thousands of people attended the seminars.
Jean Delay was a French psychiatrist, neurologist, writer, and a member of the Académie française.
The Spring Grove Experiment is a series of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) studies performed from 1963 to 1976 on patients with psychotic illnesses at the Spring Grove Clinic in Catonsville, Maryland. These patients were sponsored by a federal agency called the National Institute of Mental Health to be part of the first study conducted on the effects of psychedelic drugs on people with schizophrenia. The Spring Grove Experiments were adapted to study the effect of LSD and psychotherapy on patients including alcoholics, heroin addicts, neurotics, and terminally-ill cancer patients. The research done was largely conducted by the members of the Research Unit of Spring Grove State Hospital. Significant contributors to the experiments included Walter Pahnke, Albert Kurland, Sanford Unger, Richard Yensen, Stanislav Grof, William Richards, Francesco Di Leo, and Oliver Lee McCabe. Later, Spring Grove was rebuilt into the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center where studies continued to be performed for the advancement of psychiatric research. This study on LSD is the largest study on psychedelic drugs to date.
Andrew Feldmár is a Hungarian born psychotherapist living in Canada. He is most known as the Hungarian follower of R. D. Laing, the Scottish psychiatrist who was one of the leading figures of the counterculture of the 1960s. Laing, who later became his friend, was his teacher and therapist first. Following his mentor, Feldmár practices and popularizes a form of radical psychotherapy, where the main goal of the therapist is to engage in a real, spontaneous and honest relationship with the patient. This approach is based on the findings of research on interpersonal phenomenology, spiritual emergency, the anthropology of healing, existential psychotherapy and community therapy. Feldmár rejects the labelling of human suffering, and therefore distances himself from the mainstream forms of psychiatry and psychotherapy which are based on the concept of mental illness. He has published many books in Hungarian, he lectures, teaches, provides supervision and therapy internationally, he has worked as a psychotherapist with over 52 years of experience, having spent more than 100,000 hours in psychotherapy with clients. He has been noticeably successful treating psychotic patients. He is a well-known expert in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy.
Psychoplastogens are a group of small molecule drugs that produce rapid and sustained effects on neuronal structure and function, intended to manifest therapeutic benefit after a single administration. Several existing psychoplastogens have been identified and their therapeutic effects demonstrated; several are presently at various stages of development as medications including Ketamine, MDMA, Scopolamine, and the serotonergic psychedelics, including LSD, psilocin, DMT, and 5-MeO-DMT. Compounds of this sort are being explored as therapeutics for a variety of brain disorders including depression, addiction, and PTSD. The ability to rapidly promote neuronal changes via mechanisms of neuroplasticity was recently discovered as the common therapeutic activity and mechanism of action.
Psychedelic treatments for trauma-related disorders are the use of psychedelic substances, either alone or used in conjunction with psychotherapy, to treat trauma-related disorders. Trauma-related disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), have a lifetime prevalence of around 8% in the US population. However, even though trauma-related disorders can hinder the everyday life of individuals with them, less than 50% of patients who meet criteria for PTSD diagnosis receive proper treatment. Psychotherapy is an effective treatment for trauma-related disorders. A meta-analysis of treatment outcomes has shown that 67% of patients who completed treatment for PTSD no longer met diagnostic criteria for PTSD. For those seeking evidence-based psychotherapy treatment, it is estimated that 22-24% will drop out of their treatment. In addition to psychotherapy, pharmacotherapy (medication) is an option for treating PTSD; however, research has found that pharmacotherapy is only effective for about 59% of patients. Although both forms of treatment are effective for many patients, high dropout rates of psychotherapy and treatment-resistant forms of PTSD have led to increased research in other possible forms of treatment. One such form is the use of psychedelics.
Ronald Arthur Sandison was a British psychiatrist and psychotherapist. Among his other work. he is particularly noted for his pioneering studies and use of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) as a psychotheraputic drug. As a consultant psychiatrist, his LSD work was mainly carried out during the 1950s and '60s at Powick Hospital, a large psychiatric facility near Malvern, Worcestershire, after which he spent several years in Southampton, where he was instrumental in the establishment of the university medical school. He returned to his native Shetland Isles in the 1970s and worked in psychotherapy there. He later specialised in psychosexual medicine on the UK mainland. Sandison died at the age of 94, and was buried in Ledbury near Malvern.
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: CS1 maint: date and year (link) [The quality of intrauterine life in relation to the rest of our lives] (review by the Cypriot psychiatrist Takis Eudokas in Diavazo magazine)