It’s Mental Health Week, an annual event started by the Canadian Mental Health Association aimed at raising awareness and promoting mental wellness.
This year’s theme is Unmasking Mental Health. It’s all about recognizing that people often hide their struggles behind a “mask” to avoid feeling judged – and encouraging openness, honesty, and real connection instead.
Ron Shore, Artsci’95, MPA’02, PhD’23, has seen those masks all too often in his mental-health work over the past 30-plus years.
He founded Kingston’s Street Health Centre, a community health centre for people facing multiple barriers to health, including homelessness, trauma, and addiction, and is now an assistant professor of psychiatry at Queen’s and the interim assistant scientific director of the Canadian Institute of Military and Veteran Health Research.
Yet as often as Shore sees people using masks to protect themselves, he also sees many bravely removing them. And one emerging tool he and other researchers are now studying to help lift those masks – one once thought to do more harm than good – is psychedelic drugs like psilocybin, LSD, and MDMA.
In March, it was announced that Shore would be co-leading a funded by the Canadian Cancer Society and Brain Canada. The $5-million initiative will go towards research exploring how psilocybin and mindfulness can help ease anxiety, depression, and hopelessness for people with advanced cancers. It’s the single largest funding investment in this research in Canada.
We recently caught up with Shore to hear more about this new research, how he got interested in psychedelic therapies, and how alumni can support his work.
When and why did you start getting into psychedelics?
I’m a child of the 60s and grew up reading Alan Watts and Carlos Casteneda as a teenager. When I learned about Gabor Maté’s work with ayahuasca and its potential in treating addiction, I got more curious about potential therapeutic effects, and of course I was teaching about psychedelics as a drug class in my second-year health studies course. I always started with botany, biology, and cultural history when I taught about a drug to understand its role in society, and if you look at the spiritual and religious history of psychedelics, you can see real potential value, especially in the treatment of what are considered “culture-bound illnesses.” I’ve seen enough in addictions and mental health to know these are similarly culture bound and there are many people who do not respond to current treatments. I just don’t believe we should give up; we desperately need more research and new ideas in mental health and addictions.
Thinking about this new research program, there are other medications and therapies that can help people living with advanced cancers deal with anxiety, depression, and feelings of hopelessness. Why might psychedelics, particularly psilocybin, be a better option or something to use in combination with those other treatments?
I think it’s very suitable that this really large research program, the Canadian Network for Psychedelic-assisted Cancer Therapy (CAN-PACT), is situated within integrative oncology and cancer care. I think we acknowledge in this space the importance of feeling, of spirit, and of human connection. It seems like a very appropriate and sweet space to hold the psilocybin work, which can be quite emotionally cathartic and help with meaning-making. Anti-depressant medications may not alleviate demoralization or there may be strong side effects. With psilocybin, one possibility is just it may take just two dosing sessions, in combination with mindfulness therapy, to significantly reduce demoralization and improve quality of life. It may very much have a role not just in advanced cancer, but in general palliative care. I also think demoralization is a very helpful concept that we see in a lot of other areas in addition to advanced cancer and palliative care; it’s common among military veterans transitioning to life-after-service and demoralization itself may be a precursor to post-traumatic-stress disorder.
So how do psychedelics like psilocybin work to help alleviate demoralization? What's going on in the brain?
One theory is that psychedelics disrupt habit and help to encourage new learning. When we worry about things, we tend to think more negatively, and those thoughts can be repetitive and take over. Psychedelics can put a pause on that. They may act like when we reset our computer or other electronic systems. If circuits aren’t running well, sometimes it helps to reset them and not just continue on repeating the same troublesome path. We think that psychedelics may be great connectors, helping the different parts of our brain communicate better together. And they may give us experiences which seem significant, meaningful, and sometimes spiritual. They can open our hearts and can help us let go of fear and judgement. But we need to be careful because psychedelics can be powerful and are best approached with respect.
What are you most excited about with this new research program?
It’s really great, and uncommon, that we have five years. Many clinical trials are one-and-done, whereas with CAN-PACT we have time to develop capacity, build a network, focus on education and evidence, develop a university-based training program, and involve patients, clinicians, researchers, and policymakers in the development of the research. It’s a very thoughtful and comprehensive program of research. With psychedelics, drug regulators, including the federal government, are waiting for more evidence about psychedelics, especially safety data and therapeutic protocols. We hope to really contribute to cancer care; this is a landmark investment in psychedelic research in Canada and the single largest funding investment in this research in Canada.
How can alumni support this work?
In a few ways. Please continue to spread the word about CAN-PACT and our research here at Queen’s. We should be very proud of it. Conversations about this research are a chance to talk as well about cancer, about meaning, and about mortality. These are sensitive but important conversations to have. That’s maybe the best thing about psychedelics; they are interdisciplinary and touch on very important themes in medicine and in life. I get to have the best conversations with people. There are also various ways to contribute to the advancement of research here at Queen’s. This is a good time to give to science. It’s wonderful now for me to be in a place where I’m supporting cancer research. My mom Pat died of cancer when I was 20 and she was the most wonderful, loving person. And my dad, who passed away just two years ago here with us, was a veteran and I’m working now at CIMVHR, the Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran Health Research here at Queen’s. People can also give to CIMVHR, to help us serve those who serve us.
Learn more about , , and how you can .
