Certificate in Psychedelic Assisted Therapy
The provision of a supportive therapeutic setting prior to, during, and following drug administration is now the standard of care in the majority of uses of psychedelic medications for the treatment of psychiatric disorders. To fill this requirement, a variety of psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT) models and certifications (CPAT) have been developed to ensure the guiding clinician is sufficiently competent. These include:
- Embark[1] - Canadian / US proprietary Cybin ltd training system released in June 2022.
By comparing and contrasting each offering a new Open Source Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy has been developed. Below is a brief summary of the analysis.
Clinician Background
Personal exposure to altered states of consciousness has been hypothesised to strengthen PAP therapists' capacity to help patients by better acquainting them with the subjective experiences those patients could encounter during psychedelic medicine sessions.[2]
CPAT Content
The majority of PAP models have drawn influence from 3 main sources:
CPAT Structure
All PAP models contain three phases[5]. Preparation sessions make up the first stage and are intended to get individuals ready to benefit from the medication. The second stage of therapy is referred to as the medicine session(s), which refers to the period when medication is administered. The third phase, often known as "integration"[6] involves a process of reflection on the medicine session and how it could motivate cognitive and behavioural changes that last after the course of therapy.
References
- ↑ Models of Psychedelic-Assisted Psychotherapy: A Contemporary Assessment and an Introduction to EMBARK, a Transdiagnostic, Trans-Drug Model. William Brennan and Alexander B. Belser. Cybin, Inc., Toronto, ON, Canada and Fordham University, New York City, NY, United States. Front. Psychol., 02 June 2022 https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.866018
- ↑ Psychedelics as a training experience for psychedelic therapists: drawing on history to inform current practice. Nielson, E. M. (2021). J. Humanist. Psychol. doi: 10.1177/00221678211021204
- ↑ The role of Indigenous knowledges in psychedelic science. Fotiou, E. (2020). J. Psychedelic Stud. 4, 16–23. doi: 10.1556/2054.2019.031
- ↑ Psychedelics and the new behaviourism: considering the integration of third-wave behaviour therapies with psychedelic-assisted therapy. Walsh, Z., and Thiessen, M. S. (2018). Int. Rev. Psychiatry 30, 343–349. doi: 10.1080/09540261.2018.1474088
- ↑ The Psychotherapeutic Framing of Psychedelic Drug Administration. Front. Psychol., Sec. Psychology for Clinical Settings. Published: 02 June 2022, accessed on 9th August 2022 via: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.866018
- ↑ Psychedelic harm reduction and integration: a transtheoretical model for clinical practice. Gorman, I., Nielson, E. M., Molinar, A., Cassidy, K., and Sabbagh, J. (2021). Front. Psychol. 12:645246. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.645246