Latest news with #DrEllenBradley
Daily Mail
19-05-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
Magic mushrooms 'could help people with Parkinson's' and now large-scale clinical trial is planned
The first clinical trial exploring whether the drug found within magic mushrooms could help treat Parkinson's disease has shown promising results. It marks the first time a psychedelic has been tested on individuals with a neurodegenerative disorder. Parkinson's disease, an incurable progressive brain disorder caused by the death of nerve cells in the brain that produce dopamine, leads to movement and speech issues that worsen over time. Now, in a new landmark study, all 12 patients, with mild to moderate Parkinson's disease and an average age of 63, all reported improvements in mood, cognition and motor function, with such benefits lasting for months. Alongside psychotherapy, participants were given a 10mg dose of psilocybin followed by 25mg two weeks later. While side effects of nausea, anxiety and elevated blood pressure were noted at the follow-up appointments after the dosing sessions, none of these required medical attention. Given that no obvious signs of harm were noted, a larger trial involving up to 100 more patients has also been approved, with the study's lead author, Dr Ellen Bradley, of the University of California in San Francisco, telling The Times that the results were 'well beyond what we expected'. Parkinson's disease affects those such as 'Back to the Future' star Michael J Fox, 63 (pictured) who announced just last week that he is set to make an extraordinary return to acting after nearly three decades of livng with Parkinson's disease, which is surging across the US Dr Bradley added that while it had been 'unexpected' for an improvement in motor function and cognitive performance to have been observed, these were still 'preliminary findings' and stressed it was too early for conclusions to be drawn. Possible reasons behind the benefits of the magic mushrooms include its ability to impact brain inflammation and therefore stimulate neuroplasticity (the brain's ability to both reorganise and create new neural connections). Describing the results, which showed no 'serious side effects' despite a high-dosage of psilocybin as 'incredibly encouraging', Dr Bradley said that the 'reassuring data' now allows them to move forward with a larger trial of the hallucinogen. The researcher also remains hopeful that it will assist the ongoing endeavour to provide further treatment for Parkinson's disease, which currently affects up to 153,000 people across the UK. This figure is anticipated to rise to around 172,000 by 2030, as a result of population growth and ageing, with Parkinson's the fastest growing neurological condition in the world. It affects those such as 'Back to the Future' star Michael J Fox, 63, who announced just last week that he is set to make an extraordinary return to acting after nearly three decades of livng with Parkinson's disease, which is surging across the US. Having been diagnosed at just 29 years old, Mr Fox managed to hide his disease from the public eye for seven years, before he began appearing on screen less often as he had more trouble walking, talking and controlling tremors. Speaking about the 'really exciting next step' of a larger trial, Dr Bradley added: 'We will be able to test how effective psilocybin therapy is for people with Parkinson's and also collect multimodal biological data — from brain stimulation, imaging, blood tests — that will help us figure out exactly how psilocybin impacts different aspects of Parkinson's.' The next trial is set to be funded by both an anonymous donor and the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research.
The Independent
15-05-2025
- Health
- The Independent
New clinical study shows promise in treating Parkinson's with drug found in magic mushrooms
Could magic mushrooms be the secret ingredient for helping patients with Parkinson's disease? Researchers at the University of California at San Francisco say that using the hallucinogenic drug psilocybin - which is found in magic mushrooms - can help to improve mood, cognition and motor symptoms for people with the degenerative movement disorder. That could be good news for the more than one million Americans living with Parkinson's. It's the second-most common neurodegenerative disease after Alzheimer's disease, and the number of people who are diagnosed in the U.S. is expected to double by 2040. 'We are still in very early stages of this work, but this first study went well beyond what we expected,' Dr. Ellen Bradley, an assistant professor and associate director of UCSF's Translational Psychedelic Research Program, said in a statement. Bradley was the first author of the paper which was published earlier this month in the Nature journal Neuropsychopharmacology. Psilocybin works by entering the brain using the same receptors as serotonin, a hormone that is important for regulating mood and other brain functions. Researchers say the drug also leads to other changes in the brain, although they don't yet fully understand how all these effects may lead to improvements in symptoms. Several studies have indicated that people with Parkinson's disease have serotonin dysfunction. In the first time a psychedelic has been tested on patients with any neurodegenerative disease, participants of their research tolerated magic mushrooms without serious side effects or worsening symptoms. Psilocybin works by entering the brain u sing the same receptors – which facilitate the transfer of chemical signals from outside the brain to the inside – as serotonin, a hormone that is important for regulating mood and other brain functions. Researchers say the drug also leads to other changes in the brain, although they don't yet fully understand how all these effects may lead to improvements in symptoms. Several studies have indicated that people with Parkinson's disease have serotonin dysfunction. It was a small trial, including just seven men and five women with the neurodegenerative disease a 10 milligram dose, followed by a dose of 25 milligrams two weeks later. The patients completed eight psychotherapy sessions before and after they took the drugs, and were evaluated for any changes. Some people experienced anxiety, nausea and elevated drug pressure. But, these symptoms were not serious enough to require medical intervention. Overall, there were improvements in mood, cognition and motor symptoms at follow-up appointments after a week and a month. "Physically, I feel better than I did 2-3 years ago," Jeff Deming, one of the participants of the study, told CBS News. 'Many people don't realize this, but mood symptoms in Parkinson's are linked to a faster physical decline,' Bradley said. 'And they are actually a stronger predictor of patients' quality of life with Parkinson's than their motor symptoms.' The researchers theorized that psilocybin could provide relief from symptoms of the disease, or that feeling better could help them socialize and be more active. Now, they are conducting a larger trial, with a more diverse group of patients. They'll also incorporate the use of neuroimaging tools and noninvasive brain stimulation. With the aim of enrolling 100 participants, they are working at a second site at Yale University. Funding for the study is backed by an anonymous donor and the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research. 'The vast majority of brain diseases still lack interventions that change the course of illness,' Dr. Joshua Woolley, the study's senior authors and an associate professor at UCSF, explained. 'We can often treat the symptoms, but we don't alter the trajectory or prevent decline. Now, that's beginning to change. These results raise the exciting possibility that psilocybin may help the brain repair itself.'
CBS News
15-05-2025
- Health
- CBS News
UC San Francisco's psilocybin therapy shows promise for Parkinson's patients
On a quiet plot of land in rural New Mexico, Jeff Deming feels like he's really living, once again. "Mentally, it's day and night," he said. He's able to do the things that make him happy, like woodworking, despite living with Parkinson's Disease. "Physically, I feel better than I did 2-3 years ago," he said. Deming credits the treatment he received during a first-of-its-kind clinical study he participated in at the University of California, San Francisco: Psilocybin therapy for people with Parkinson's Disease. "This is very cliché, but it truly gave me my life back," he said. Psilocybin is a naturally occurring psychedelic compound found in 'magic mushrooms.' When administered in controlled, clinical research settings, it has shown promise in treating depression and anxiety, both of which are mood symptoms associated with Parkinson's that are linked to a faster physical decline. "The neurodegeneration that is happening isn't just impacting motor circuitry – it's impacting a lot of brain circuitry. That creates this huge burden of symptoms that we often overlook and don't talk about enough, maybe," said Dr. Ellen Bradley, of UCSF. "We were really surprised by how well this trial went." Bradley and a team of researchers at UCSF are trying to figure out how Psilocybin may help treat mood dysfunction and more in those living with the neurodegenerative disease. "This is a first step, and now we've opened the door to being able to really investigate the effects of Psilocybin for people with Parkinson's," she said. 12 patients participated in this first-round study, which involved a first and second course of Psilocybin treatment. "We had folks do a lower dose of Psilocybin – a 10 mg dose initially – and monitored them for a couple of weeks to see how that went," Bradley said. "If it did go well, if we didn't have safety concerns, then they were eligible for the full therapeutic dose of 25 mg." All 12 patients were able to complete both courses of treatment without reporting any serious side effects, according to Bradley. "We want to find out not just does Psilocybin therapy work, but if it does, how does it work? That mechanistic piece is so important," she said. "Can it change the brain's ability to adapt to its environment and to rewire itself?" While there were no serious adverse effects reported, every patient didn't have the same life-changing experience as Deming says he experienced. Though many did report their motor and cognitive functions improved afterwards, per Bradley. "We don't have a reason to believe that this is a treatment that is going to be a good fit for every patient. That is never really our expectation in medicine. But our goal is to figure out when is it the right treatment and how much for which patient," Bradley said. Bradley says her team is scaling up their work and are in the process of recruiting for a larger study, due to the success with the initial research. "That was really exciting just to see that promising safety profile in this initial pilot. That kind of gives us a green light to go forward with more in-depth research," she said. "We really desperately need new treatments for Parkinson's. It's a very quickly growing disease that's becoming more and more prevalent in our population, so, we really feel like we have to be investigating every possible route that could mean new treatments for patients." Two years removed from his controlled Psilocybin dosing, Deming says he feels better now than he did when he received his initial diagnosis four years ago. "Something about this experience just freed everything back up so I could think again, I could dream again," he said. He'd like to see more research into psychedelic therapies for a range of conditions, with the hopes that more people will be able to reclaim the reins of life, as he has. "There's been such a stigma against the research with it," he said. "It is definitely worth looking more closely at."
