‘It’s really making sure that people in northern Ontario have the same access as those who are in Toronto and the bigger cities, with an experienced clinical team supporting them,’ said Field Trip Health CEO
A mental health and wellness organization recently offered its first-ever MDMA-assisted psychotherapy treatment in Sault Ste. Marie.
Although it’s more commonly known as a recreational drug, clinical trials show MDMA has useful applications in treating post-traumatic stress disorder – something one local patient was able to experience at Field Trip Health this summer.
For CEO Ian Ruberry, the treatment marks a step forward in offering northern residents the same opportunities as someone in a larger urban centre, without the need to travel to Toronto or another major city.
“It’s really making sure that people in northern Ontario have the same access as those who are in Toronto and the bigger cities, with an experienced clinical team supporting them,” he said.
“That’s really the future we’re trying to build. That’s what makes us excited.”
The treatment works by dosing the patient in a clinical setting, where they spend upwards of several hours speaking with a psychotherapist – providing a rare window to process deeply-rooted trauma.
“With a proper psychotherapist that has a proper approach, the MDMA puts them in a state where they can process the trauma in a better and deeper and more meaningful way,” said Dr. Mario Nucci, a family physician and co-founder of Field Trip Health.
“They can now open up, and they can work through that and try to repair that trauma memory that’s lodged in their mind.”
As an organization that offers psychedelic mental health treatments at clinics around Canada, Field Trip Health was able to successfully obtain the drug through the special access program with Health Canada.
The program allows health care professionals to request access to drugs that are not available for sale, and the organization was able to secure the drug to offer treatment to a local patient.
“We had a client who was interested in this and met the criteria when they met with our medical team, so this was suggested to them as a potential pathway,” Ruberry said.
For the right patient, MDMA can make a big impact.
A Phase 3 trial published in Nature Medicine showed that 71.2 per cent of patients did not meet criteria for PTSD anymore after receiving the treatment.
“To put that into perspective, when patients get standard of care for PTSD, around 50 per cent of these patients will be treatment resistant,” Nucci said.
“This type of treatment is a powerful and important tool in the toolkit.”
Accessed on a case-by-case basis, Nucci hopes MDMA can become more easily obtainable for the right patients – which has the potential to happen in the near future.
A bill to amend the Food and Drugs Act, Bill C-265, is currently before federal politicians, which proposes to establish a list of therapeutic products pre-approved for special access in health care settings.
“I would like to see . . . MDMA-assisted therapy included on a list like that, so that it becomes easier to access,” Nucci said.
“We just want to help people with these important mental health tools because people are out there and they’re struggling.”