Pharmacist Guide to Psilocybin and Psychedelic-Assisted Psychotherapy

PURPOSE: This primer is designed to provide a broad overview of psilocybin and its use in medically supervised settings as part of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. This article will act as a framework to give practicing pharmacists the knowledge they need regarding pharmacology, pharmacokinetics, contraindications, adverse effects, and drug interactions that would impact safe use of psilocybin in medical settings. SUMMARY: Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy has re-emerged in the last twenty years as a potential pathway to address a variety of mental health disorders. Interest in psilocybin has experienced a renaissance, and there have been pushes at federal, state, and local levels to expand access to this agent in research settings and within psychotherapy offices. While generally considered a very safe therapy, psilocybin does have several contraindications and clinically relevant drug-drug interactions that need to be considered when evaluating patient candidacy for psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy. CONCLUSION: Pharmacists play an important role in ensuring safe and effective use of psilocybin as it becomes more readily available and utilized across the globe. Recognition of relevant contraindications and drug-drug interactions is particularly essential to this process.