INDIANAPOLIS — They’re typically known as “Magic Mushrooms” and they have caught the eye of Indiana’s lawmakers.
Lawmakers are looking at the clinical use of mushrooms to help people suffering from mental illnesses, including veterans with PTSD.
Dave Everett served in the Air Force and recently opened up about his struggles with depression. He says a few years ago he posted what he was going through on social media to reach other veterans.
“It was mainly about my fight with depression and what depression looks like,” Everett said. “Most people that knew me would never know I had any mental health issues because I was pretty good at hiding it, so I thought putting it out there would help others speak about it."
Aaron Bacon, with Indy Warrior Partnership, says he got to his position with the organization by talking about what he was going through.
Bacon is an army veteran who dealt with depression and other issues that stemmed from combat experience.
“I tried a lot, going to the VA, talking to psychiatrists, was on medications and it never seemed to help. I always found the side effects of the medications were always worse than the benefits,” Bacon said.
Indiana State Sen. Ed Charbonneau authored Senate Bill 139, which would establish a therapeutic psilocybin research fund to study the use of psilocybin to treat mental health conditions like PTSD, depression and anxiety.
“It’s important that I say this has nothing to do with legalizing anything,” Charbonneau said. “My intent here is to elevate the discussion.”
Psilocybin is a compound that's naturally found in mushrooms.
“Over a fairly long period of time, scientists have figured out that it may have some therapeutic properties when administered in low doses to people,” Dr. Leslie Hulvershorn, with IU Health Physicians Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, said.
Hulvershorn says right now, research like this is being done at places like Johns Hopkins and Yale.
Earlier this month, the VA announced they would be funding studies to determine the benefits of psychedelics for treating veterans with PTSD and depression.
“We already have a strong reputation in a lot of areas, but we don’t have a reputation [with this] yet. We have not done work in psilocybin so I would welcome the opportunity to do more work in Indiana," Hulvershorn said.
Everett and Bacon say they would want to see results and more studies first but are for anything that will help their fellow veterans.
“I think that something natural is always going to be more beneficial than a lot of these hard core medications that they’re putting people on,” Bacon said.
Senate Bill 139 passed unanimously out of the health committee and now moves to the appropriations committee.
