WORLD JOURNAL OF ADVANCE
HEALTHCARE RESEARCH

Paloma Garcia, BS Candidate, Michael Wang, MD Candidate, Rachel Pearl, MD, Jonathan Dang, MD, Salma Abdelmoteleb, MD, Itai Danovitch, MD, MBA and Waguih William IsHak, MD, FAPA*

ABSTRACT

Objective: Psilocybin has been researched as a treatment for a variety of psychiatric disorders, with increasinglyrobust evidence for its efficacy in treating depressive disorders. As psilocybin gains legitimacy for clinical use, weforesee a climate in which there will be increased accessibility among the general population. The purpose of thispaper is to review the literature concerning the acute effects of psilocybin in non-clinical populations to answerthe following questions: (a) What is the impact of psilocybin in non-clinical populations in the acute phase? (b)What are the acute effects of different psilocybin doses in non-clinical populations? Methods: FollowingPRISMA guidelines, studies published from January 1990 to December 2023 pertaining to the acute effects ofpsilocybin in non-clinical populations were identified from the PubMed database, using the keywords:?psilocybin‘ AND ?acute‘ OR ?immediate‘, AND ?effects‘ AND ?healthy‘ OR ?volunteer‘ OR ?non-clinical?. Twoauthors independently conducted a focused analysis and reached a final consensus on 32 studies that met thespecific selection criteria and passed the study quality checks. Results: Among the 32 studies of non-clinicalpopulations, 30 were clinical trials, and 2 were pooled analyses. Doses ranged between very low (less than5mg/70 kg), low (8-12 mg/70kg), medium (15-20mg/70kg), and high (22-30mg/70kg). Low doses of psilocybinwere found to induce altered states of consciousness and mystical experiences, which intensified with higherdoses. Studies showed that psilocybin is associated with dose-dependent cognitive impairments in domains suchas attention, inhibition, and memory as well as adverse effects such as transient increases in systolic and diastolicblood pressure, heart rate, and dose-dependent anxiety, fear, paranoia, fatigue, headache, and difficulty withconcentration. Conclusion: This review details a broad range of perceived benefits and risks associated withpsilocybin use in healthy volunteers. Specifically, we identified highly variable, dose-dependent effects onconsciousness, mysticism, affect, and cognition. Findings from our review indicate that the risks associated withpsilocybin use are relatively low. However, most studies in our review were conducted among volunteersassociated with mainstream demographics in industrialized communities. While psilocybin can be confirmed assafe for certain non-clinical populations, there is a need for further research among more diverse populations togeneralize these conclusions.

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