From our February newsletter. Subscribe here.
Hi Friends,
I was driving down the road and a story about the therapeutic potential of psychedelics came up on NPR. A few days later, I saw veterans using psilocybin to treat their PTSD on 60 Minutes. It’s clear that psychedelics are in the mainstream. Beyond the tens of millions of people with mental illness that could be helped, the benefits like increased feelings of awe, connectedness, and love are particularly resonant these days.
But this made me wonder, if awareness is at an all time high, then why is it that, relatively speaking, so few have actually experienced psilocybin?
Based on the media coverage alone, I would think that there would be pent-up demand and waiting lists at Oregon Service Centers. But that’s not what we’ve seen. The Healing Advocacy Fund estimates that only 8,500 sessions have taken place since the Oregon program launched about a year and a half ago. While these sessions may have been profound for participants, it’s a drop in the bucket when considering the size of the potential market.
With Colorado about to see its first legal Healing Centers open in the coming months, Althea has begun to turn our focus to what we see as the core problem to solve in this space:
How do we get people from awareness to healing?
There is a chasm between those points. The psychedelic-informed often find themselves acting as shepherds across the void, helping friends and family find the medicine, retreats, or guides. I’m no stranger to playing this role.
While talking about the potential of psychedelics is mainstream, and two states provide legal pathways, the user experience of actually finding treatment is quite poor. If someone with depression hears about the potential of psilocybin therapy and Googles “psilocybin for depression”, they’ll have to wade through six pages(!) of search results before they would find an article from an actual service provider who could help them. (And it happens to be a great article from our friends at Odyssey.)
The market is highly fragmented. A participant has to either take a risky leap of faith or be courageous enough to network their way into a trusted facilitator. We all have loved ones who could benefit from the intentional use of psilocybin. I’m interested in what you think it would take to get them across the chasm?
This is where my head has been lately. Althea is starting to match up potential clients with trusted facilitators in the regulated space. My thought is, if we obsess over building this bridge, more people can cross it.
Sincerely,
Niko Skievaski
Niko Skievaski
Co-founder of Althea
At the foot of the Rockies
We’re readying our platform for the Colorado Natural Medicine Program and couldn’t be more excited to launch in our home state, alongside licensees.
- We created an AI Chatbot trained on the hundreds of pages of CO laws, rules, and guidelines. Find it here.
- Facilitators can already set up your free account here. We’re also building out a group of facilitators in our CO referral network. Apply here.
- Prospective Healing Centers should set up a call with us so we can get you on board. Reply to this email or send us a note here. (It’s also free for Healing Centers!)
For Oregon (our first love)
About 30% of sessions in the Oregon program are now documented in Althea! We value your trust and collaboration as we’ve figured this out together.
- Tell lawmakers to support Oregon Psilocybin Services.
- Facilitators – if you haven’t set up your account yet, start here. Once you‘re in, let us know which Service Center(s) you work with. We’re also starting to refer clients to facilitators in Oregon. If you‘d like to be considered, apply here.
- Service Centers – SB 303 reporting is live (check out the Reports tab.) Data is aggregated for easy OHA reporting come end of quarter. We also created the functionality to create a prospect contact and refer them to a facilitator.
How to get your mom to take psilocybin?
For us, we’ve thought a lot about our moms, or dads, or loved ones who we would encourage to embark on a psilocybin-assisted healing journey. We’ve started creating resources to help with these conversations, answer their questions, and put them at ease.
- We created a page to help guide people through the process of talking to a loved one about psychedelics. We’d love your thoughts.
- We’ve released a slew of share-worthy content to follow up conversations on psilocybin therapy with loved ones. Experiences, facilitators, and sources cited.
- Take the Psychedelic Preparedness Scale. Developed and validated by researchers at UCL, we’ve created a simple way to take the assessment and analyze the results.
👋 Meet Lex!
Lex Joyal is a microdosing and integration coach who was an Althea super user before we convinced her to join the Althea team. She’s helping prospective clients navigate the landscape and get matched up with facilitators using Althea.
- Read more about her on our team page.
- Lex’s blog is also a great resource for those considering working with psychedelics
See you at SXSW?
Will you be in Austin for South by Southwest? We’ll be there 3/7-13 and would love to connect. Find us here:
- ACT3: Waves of Perception, a psychedelic art party on Saturday night. This is THE unofficial psychedelic gathering at SXSW. Proceeds support the Center for Shamanic Education and Exchange. Find Althea in the Casa Akasha Smoke & Tea Lounge. Yeah, we’re excited too.
- Expo hall, Sunday through Wednesday booth #636.
Or reach out to schedule a meeting!
Do you like our new look? We’re pretty pumped about it. It also came with a new domain and website: withalthea.com. The old domain should be forwarded, but you may find it helpful to update your bookmarks and contacts.
<3
