{"id":80366,"date":"2025-02-26T10:08:09","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T18:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/02\/26\/missouri-lawmakers-consider-psychedelic-assisted-therapy-to-aid-military-veterans-with-ptsd\/"},"modified":"2025-02-26T19:48:19","modified_gmt":"2025-02-27T03:48:19","slug":"missouri-lawmakers-consider-psychedelic-assisted-therapy-to-aid-military-veterans-with-ptsd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/02\/26\/missouri-lawmakers-consider-psychedelic-assisted-therapy-to-aid-military-veterans-with-ptsd\/","title":{"rendered":"Missouri Lawmakers Consider Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy To Aid Military Veterans With PTSD"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

\u201cAntidepressants and years of counseling could be helpful, but it is not turning the tide.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

By Rebecca Rivas, Missouri Independent<\/strong><\/p>\n

In hopes of helping veterans facing mental health issues, Missouri lawmakers are once again pushing legislation that would require the state to conduct a study on using psilocybin\u2014also known as \u201cmagic mushrooms\u201d<\/a>\u2014to treat depression, substance use or as part end-of-life care.<\/p>\n

Similar legislation has been filed for the last three years, and in 2023 the House voted overwhelmingly in support of the idea. But it\u2019s never made its way to the Senate.<\/p>\n

On Monday, several members of the House Veterans Committee said they were staunchly against the proposal when they first heard about it. However, research the committee has explored over the years has changed their minds.<\/p>\n

That includes studies done by psychiatry researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, who were the first in Missouri to give a legal dose of psilocybin in 2019.<\/p>\n

They have been using a brain-imaging technique to learn how psilocybin affects certain networks in the brain.<\/p>\n

The bill\u2019s sponsor, Republican state Rep. Richard West of Wentzville, said he was skeptical at first, as a former police officer.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd obviously I\u2019m here presenting this to you today,\u201d West said, \u201cso I 100 percent believe in the effectiveness of this treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Democratic state Sen. Stephen Webber of Columbia has filed a companion bill in the Senate.<\/p>\n

During Monday\u2019s hearing, several lawmakers said they were passionate about seeing the study advance. Among them was state Rep. Michael Johnson, a Kansas City Democrat who served in Operation Desert Storm.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish this was available then or we knew more about it then,\u201d Johnson said, \u201cbecause I\u2019ve seen the ill effects that the war has caused on a lot of my fellow comrades. And some have even taken their lives because they didn\u2019t have an opportunity to have something like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

This bill requires the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services to provide grants totaling $3 million for the research, subject to lawmakers approving the appropriation.<\/p>\n

The state would collaborate on the study with a Missouri university hospital or medical center operated by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in Missouri. The focus of the treatment is on veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, substance use disorders or for those who require end-of-life care.<\/p>\n

The suicide rate among veterans in Missouri is nearly double the state rate and one of the highest in the country.<\/p>\n

The committee heard from several veterans who spoke about their experiences. One of those who spoke in favor of the bill Monday evening was John Hernandez, a former Marine and CEO of EagleCrest Recovery drug treatment centers, where 75 percent of his clients have a PTSD diagnosis.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe current treatment model is just not working,\u201d he said, \u201cif you understand the relapse rates and recovery. Antidepressants and years of counseling could be helpful, but it is not turning the tide. And we are very excited to see that the state of Missouri could possibly be a forerunner in the United States as far as providing treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n

This story was first published by Missouri Independent.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Psilocybin-Assisted Therapy Is Effective In Treating Methamphetamine Addiction, New Study Says<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Photo courtesy of Wikimedia\/M\u00e4di<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

The post Missouri Lawmakers Consider Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy To Aid Military Veterans With PTSD<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\nRead More: Missouri Lawmakers Consider Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy To Aid Military Veterans With PTSD<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cAntidepressants and years of counseling could be helpful, but it is not turning the tide.\u201d By Rebecca Rivas, Missouri Independent In hopes of helping veterans facing mental health issues, Missouri lawmakers are once again pushing legislation that would require the state to conduct a study on using psilocybin\u2014also known asContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":457,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80366"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80366"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80367,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80366\/revisions\/80367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}