Listen to this article 3 min
The VA Portland Health Care System opened a new facility at its Vancouver campus on Monday that will focus on psychedelic therapy, the only center of its kind on a VA campus in the country.
The VA Portland is also the first VA facility in the U.S. to begin active psychedelic therapy clinical trials. The Social Neuroscience & Psychotherapy Lab, known as the SNaP Lab, is located at an existing building on the campus, with funding from the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Foundation for both the remodeling and the clinical trials.
Dr. Christopher Stauffer, a psychiatrist, clinical researcher and director of social neuroscience and psychotherapy at Portland VA, was the driving force behind the SNaP Lab.
He said his goal was to open the center after he began working for VA Portland in 2020, but Covid delayed the timing. Now it’s not only up and running, but has two clinical trials in the works, with a third one soon to start.
Stauffer said it's important to distinguish the research at the VA facility from Oregon’s voter-passed, regulated system for psilocybin services. While psilocybin is a Schedule 1 drug under federal law, the VA is using synthetic psilocybin in its clinical trials.
“What we’re doing at the VA is all federally sanctioned and overseen by the Food and Drug Administration,” Stauffer said in an interview last week. “They’re not recommending psychedelics outside of a clinical setting and just within a clinical trial. What’s going on in Oregon is a whole other beast, with different rules.”
The building has two individual psilocybin therapy rooms and one for groups, separate from the regular medical clinic on the campus.
“It’s nice to have our own private space to do this research,” Stauffer said. “It’s nice to have it away from distractions.”
One of the clinical trials is focused on MDMA-assisted group therapy. The other is on psilocybin assisted therapy for methamphetamine use disorder. The VA is enrolling veterans who have been admitted to its residential substance use disorder program, Stauffer said. The third clinical trial will be a multi-state Phase 3 study of the use of psilocybin for major depressive disorder.
About 30 people are connected to the new lab, some employees and some volunteers, Stauffer said.