A Kingston, Ont., hospital network and university are opening a new medical psychedelics research centre.
The Centre for Psychedelics Health and Research launched Wednesday at the eastern Ontario city’s Providence Care Hospital.
Psychedelics are drugs that cause psychological effects in the person who consumes them, such as hallucinations.
Indigenous people have been using psychedelics as healing tools for millenia.
Canadian researchers have been studying the effects of drugs such as psilocybin (the psychoactive compound in magic mushrooms), LSD and ketamine on mental health conditions. While those three are controlled substances, Health Canada can allow their use in medical trials.
Queen’s Dean of Health Sciences Jane Philpott said in a news release the centre will be an important step toward building a “knowledge base” to support patients struggling with mental health and substance use.
The news release said the centre plans to train health-care professionals to use psychedelics as a therapeutic tool, host community workshops to share knowledge and fight the stigma associated with psychedelics.
It also mentioned chronic pain and palliative care as areas it’s interested in.
WATCH | A look at a company that helps run trials:
Health Canada is facing pressure to speed up research into the therapeutic potential of magic mushrooms to help people facing significant mental health issues, including PTSD. CBC’s Joel Ballard visits a legal psilocybin grow-op and breaks down the demand, the potential benefits and the red tape.
The centre’s new director Dr. Claudio Soares, the chair of a psychedelics science committee at the school, wrote he believes the new centre will help Canada “make informed choices about the efficacy and safety of psychedelics in the future.”
The centre also has support from the Ontario Brain Institute and the Canadian Biomarker Integration Network in Depression, where Soares is a founder and executive.
Though the centre opened Wednesday, it’s in its early days; it still needs to be outfitted to conduct the trials and other work it hopes to host.