Speaker Bio
Mathieu Seynaeve, MD, is Senior Medical Director and Head of Psychotherapy at Beckley Psytech(BPL). At BPL, he has been involved in designing clinical studies with 5-MeO-DMT for Treatment Resistant Depression (TRD), Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD), development of the psychotherapeutic support models, therapist training and supportive resources for study participants. Prior to joining BPL, Mathieu was a senior research associate in the Psychoactive Trials Group at at the Centre for Affective Disorders, IoPPN, supervised by Dr James Rucker and Professor Allan Young, and worked on placebo controlled clinical trials with psilocybin for Treatment Resistant Depression. Alongside his role at BPL, he is currently undertaking a PhD looking at psychological mechanisms of psychedelic psychotherapy and is training as a Jungian Analyst at the Society for Analytic Psychology.
ICPR 2024 Abstract
Best practices for patient-centred psychedelic clinical trials
Theoretical Background and Rationale:
Psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT) holds great promise for addressing the huge unmet needs faced by people living with neuropsychiatric conditions but best practices for ensuring participant well-being throughout PAT are yet to be developed. PsyPAN, a non-profit organisation dedicated to enhancing participant safety and well-being in psychedelic studies, has partnered with Beckley Psytech, a clinical-stage biotechnology company leading the development of psychedelic medicines, to understand the most effective means of supporting patients through a psychedelic treatment model. This transformative project has culminated in the creation of a groundbreaking whitepaper which is intended to be used as a playbook for all industry stakeholders, to be launched at ICPR.
Research Question and Hypothesis:
The central question this collaborative project sought to address was: How can the lived experiences of individuals in psychedelic clinical trials enhance participant safety, inform best practices, and scale research effectively?
Methods and Analysis:
PsyPAN and Beckley Psytech convened a Patient Council and conducted several workshops to extract participant’s valuable insights. They then undertook a thematic analysis of the insights and synthesised these into a whitepaper, focusing on enhancing participant safety, well-being and therapeutic outcomes in psychedelic research.
Main Findings:
The whitepaper offers a patient-centred framework for ensuring participant well-being throughout the psychedelic treatment process, emphasising the importance of trust, communication and psychedelically-informed support before, during and after treatment.
Conclusion:
The whitepaper, to be launched at ICPR, signifies a vital step in psychedelic research and formulates best practices to ensure safer and more effective psychedelic therapy.