PT391 – Dr. Devon Christie & Dr. Pamela Kryskow, MD – MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy For Fibromyalgia and Other Central Sensitization Syndromes
Psychedelics Today
Psychedelics Today, LLC
4.6 • 598 Ratings
🗓️ 21 February 2023
⏱️ 71 minutes
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Summary
In this episode, Joe interviews Dr. Devon Christie: Senior Lead of Psychedelic Programs at Numinus, educator at CIIS and Vital, and MAPS-certified MDMA therapist; and Dr. Pamela Kryskow, MD: founding board member of the Psychedelic Association of Canada and Medical Lead of the nonprofit, Roots To Thrive.
Christie and Kryskow recently co-authored one of the first papers looking at MDMA for chronic pain, "MDMA-assisted therapy is associated with a reduction in chronic pain among people with post-traumatic stress disorder," which came about after they received access to MAPS' Phase 2 data from a lead-in PTSD study and noticed significant improvements in pain measurements – something the study was not looking for at all. They're looking into where chronic pain fits within the frameworks of Western medicine and psychedelic-assisted therapy, and discuss the many reasons why MDMA should be tremendously helpful for chronic pain and other conditions that fall under the large umbrella of central sensitivity syndromes and nociplastic pain. They are currently working on a new study following the MAPS protocol that will research MDMA-assisted psychotherapy specifically for people with fibromyalgia, which some believe might be physicalized PTSD. If you'd like to contribute a tax-deductible donation, visit giving.viu.ca, select "other" from the dropdown, and type in "MDMA for Fibromyalgia."
They talk about how research trials focus too much on the molecule while ignoring what the patient is saying; how a large percentage of physicians and patients don't at all like the psychometrics used in measuring data; how physicians regularly use expectancy bias but research trials don't (and how that affects results); why everyone needs to place higher importance on the biopsychosocial model; the idea of being more humble with science and using "theoretical" more often; the problems with microdosing trials; and the issues with evidence: If there isn't sufficient evidence, why isn't there? And what exactly would be sufficient?
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello there, it's David here, letting you all know that vital our 12-month psychedelic therapies and integration course is still accepting new applications. |
| 0:10.1 | The course itself starts in April and the early bird discount finishes on March the 3rd. |
| 0:16.8 | So definitely apply as soon as you can. We sold out last year and we definitely expect to do the same this year. |
| 0:22.1 | And to give you a feel for it, it's been amazing this time around. |
| 0:25.1 | Absolutely loved it. |
| 0:26.9 | Transformational for the students and for us personally and professionally. |
| 0:30.3 | So it's 12 months course with five modules and each module has a different focus |
| 0:35.3 | and weekly lectures, including people like Adele LaFronts, Devin |
| 0:38.9 | Christie, Bill Richards, Manish Goern, Kylia Taylor, Ben Sessa, Lynne Marie Morski, Dick Schwartz, |
| 0:46.0 | people like that, and also weekly study groups, folks like me and Kyle Bula, Dr. Dominique |
| 0:52.6 | Marasano, Quasier Ducey, Jasmine Verdi, Melanie Pincus and Mike Sapiro. |
| 0:58.3 | There are also monthly webinars that you'll join, and electives in the summer and the winter that you'll get to choose from four or five different courses, kind of mini bite-size electives. |
| 1:08.0 | And there's a retreat that you'll get to choose from around the world, |
| 1:11.5 | different options that we have, and an online community platform on Circle that you'll get |
| 1:16.3 | two years free membership to. So if you'd like to find them, we'll go to vitalpsychedelic |
| 1:21.2 | training.com. And please do apply soon. Thanks everyone. |
| 1:39.4 | Hello everybody and welcome. Hello, everybody and welcome back to psychedelics today. This is Joe Moore coming at you from |
| 1:40.2 | Breck and Rich, Colorado. Today on the show, we have Dr. Devin Christy and Dr. Pam |
| 1:46.1 | Crisco. Both, I think, might have been on the show before. This could be actually Dr. Pam's |
| 1:52.1 | first appearance, honestly. And today we actually talk about MDMA for fibromyalgia and assorted |
| 1:58.4 | chronic pain conditions. As you all know, this is a favorite topic of mine and just really hopeful that more |
| 2:06.5 | and more people are coming together on this. |
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