• Posted June 17, 2025

Psychedelics Can Help Cancer Patients Battling Depression

TUESDAY, June 17, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Magic mushrooms might be key to quelling depression among people battling cancer.

A single dose of psilocybin provided sustained reductions in depression and anxiety among cancer patients diagnosed with major depression, according to small-scale study published June 16 in the journal Cancer.

“One dose of psilocybin with psychological support to treat depression has a long-term positive impact on relieving depression for as much as two years for a substantial portion of patients with cancer, and we’re exploring whether repeating the treatment resolves depression for more than half of the patients,” lead researcher Dr. Manish Agrawal, CEO and co-founder of Sunstone Therapies, said in a news release.

About 25% of people living with cancer have depression severe enough it can impact their odds of survival, researchers said in background notes.

For the phase 2 clinical trial, 28 patients with cancer and major depression took a single 25-milligram dose of psilocybin while being guided by a therapist. Psilocybin is the active ingredient in magic mushrooms.

Two years later, about half of the patients had significant and sustained reduction in their depression symptoms, results show.

For a quarter of the patients, their sustained reduction in depression did not require any additional psychedelic or antidepressant medications, researchers said.

About 43% also had sustained reduction of anxiety symptoms, researchers added.

Previous research has noted that these sort of positive benefits come when someone takes a psilocybin trip under a therapist’s direction. Studies have not found any benefit from taking psilocybin without a therapist on hand. 

Research is needed to see whether repeat doses might help those who didn’t get relief from a single session, the research team said.

There also need to be randomized controlled trials to provide gold-standard evidence for the usefulness of psilocybin, they said.

“If randomized testing shows similar results, this could lead to greater use of psilocybin to treat depression in patients with cancer,” Agrawal said.

The new study dovetails with other efforts to integrate psychedelics into mental health treatment, including a new Texas initiative to fund research into ibogaine. The psychedelic, which is illegal across the U.S., may help treat addiction depression and brain injuries, supporters say.

More information

Johns Hopkins has more on psilocybin treatment for major depression.

SOURCES: American Cancer Society, news release, June 16, 2025; Cancer, June 16, 2025