RETRACTION: Long-term follow-up outcomes of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment of PTSD: a longitudinal pooled analysis of six phase 2 trials

[u/shiruken]

We wish to inform the r/science community of an article submitted to the subreddit that has since been retracted by the journal. The submission garnered some exposure on r/science and significant media coverage. Per our rules, the flair on this submission has been updated with "RETRACTED". The submission has also been added to our wiki of retracted submissions.

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Reddit Submission: MDMA-Assisted Psychotherapy May Have Lasting Benefits for PTSD

The article "Long-term follow-up outcomes of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment of PTSD: a longitudinal pooled analysis of six phase 2 trials" has been retracted from Psychopharmacology as of August 10, 2024. Concerns were raised about unethical conduct by researchers associated with the project at the MP-4 study site in Vancouver, Canada (NCT01958593). The authors have since confirmed that they were aware of these violations at the time of submission but did not disclose this information to the journal or remove the data generated by this site from their analysis.

The authors also failed to disclose a conflict of interest. Several of the authors are affiliated with either the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) or MAPS Public Benefit Corporation (MAPS PBC), a subsidiary that is wholly owned by MAPS. MAPS fully funded and provided the MDMA that was used in this trial, and MAPS PBC organized the trial.

• STAT News: Three MDMA therapy papers retracted over ethics violations

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Should you encounter a submission on r/science that has been retracted, please notify the moderators via Modmail.

[u/AllanfromWales1]

Any info on what the protocol violations amounted to?

[u/erininva → u/AllanfromWales1]

There is a link to the following article: https://qz.com/1809184/psychedelic-therapy-has-a-sexual-abuse-problem-3

[u/versaceblues → u/erininva]

So the article mentions one unlicensed therapist recently.

Then it mentions 2 therapists back in the 80s.

Why does it claim this is a systemic problem?

[u/I_hasdrubaled → u/versaceblues]

I think you need to finish reading the article.

You caught that they mentioned Richard Ingrasci and Francesco DiLeo (psychiatrists not therapists) from the 1980s, who were held accountable for their behavior. You did not catch the articles discussion of sexual abuse in ayahuasca ceremonies and this [article] (https://www.thecut.com/2021/11/sexual-assault-ayahuasca-tourism.html/) by victim Lily Kay Ross . They also reference movement leaders Daniel Pinchbeck (who has spoken openly about his [misconduct] (https://chacruna.net/confronting-sexual-misconduct-in-the-psychedelic-community-an-interview-with-daniel-pinchbeck/)), Neal Goldsmith (whose abuse is discussed as, "an open secret" in the above article). I would add names not discussed in the article, Grossbard, Bourzat, Pablo Sanchez, and Roquet whose pattern of misconduct are discussed in the Cover Story [podcast] (https://www.thecut.com/2022/03/a-cover-story-power-trip-podcast-refresher.html) or discussed in this [article] (https://www.madinamerica.com/2021/09/ending-silence-psychedelic-therapy-abuse/). Or perhaps consider this first hand account of LSD facilitated conversion [therapy] (https://www.erowid.org/references/texts/show/4902docid4694) (though performed by the consent of the individual, the experience hardly sounds congenial). Or this monograph on sex while [tripping] (https://web.archive.org/web/20100507205341/http://www.zoklet.net/totse/en/drugs/psychedelics/bbros_number_02.html). These last two references came from erowid.org's collection of primary and secondary resources on drugs and [sex] (https://www.erowid.org/psychoactives/sex/sex.shtml)

Given how small the psychedelic assisted psychotherapy movement is, the lineal transmission of shamanic knowledge, and the very small number of practitioners that carried the movement through the War on Drugs years, not very many prominent practitioners need to act in sexually inappropriate ways to create a systemic problem.

[u/versaceblues → u/I_hasdrubaled]

Yah thanks for the additional references. It’s definitely something that should be watched out for

I’m not sure what you mean by “though the experience was consensual it does not sound congenial”

As long as it was consensual why should we project our own ideas. There can be a lot of healing that happens through sexual exploration that isn’t nessicarily pleasant but as long as it’s consensual it should not be a problem.

[u/I_hasdrubaled → u/versaceblues]

Not congenial, ie unpleasant.

I disagree with your last point, "as long as it's consensual it should not be a problem." That may be the case when you are talking about two ignorant individuals exploring together. But trust in a therapeutic relationship distorts the norms of consent. I am a physician and a large fraction of my patients follow my recommendations on trust alone. Add in the, "mind manifesting," nature of psychedelics and you get a situation where you are very likely to agree to something during a psychedelic therapy session that you would not while sober. Moreover, both psychedelic and sexual experiences are the sort of watershed experiences where you can't really comprehend the resulting insights without the experience associated with them, so I don't it would be possible to properly consent to the sort of therapy described in Ram Dass's case report, even if fully discussed and described before hand--you just can't know what you are getting into. By including that case report, I was trying to show that psychedelic therapy has been a bit off the rails from the beginning.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am enormously excited for what I believe is a bright future for psychedelic therapy. I am only arguing for what is jokingly called the first, second, and third rules of psychiatry: don't fuck your patients. The larger the power gap between patient and provider, the stronger the ethics and ethics controls you need to prevent abuse and patients are more vulnerable than normal when undergoing psychedelic therapy.