The Use of Psychedelics for Grief Following Death due to Advanced Illness: A Scoping Review

Background: There is promising evidence that psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy may be a powerful new treatment approach for mortality-related distress. However, less is known about the possible benefits for people experiencing grief. Aim: To explore what is known about using psychedelics to attend to grief following death due to advanced illness. Design: This scoping review followed Arskey and O'Malley's methodological framework and adheres to the PRISMA-ScR reporting guidelines. Searches were conducted in seven databases in April 2023, and updated in December 2023. No limits or filters were applied. The quality of the papers was not appraised. Results: Of the 4614 records screened, 18 reports were included. Seven are empirical investigations of the impact of psychedelics on grief. This literature is informed by different epistemologies, ontologies, and conceptualizations of grief, adding a layer of complexity and potential for conflict to arise due to differing perspectives. Overall, there is little high-quality evidence about the use of psychedelics to attend to grief. However, across the empirical studies, positive outcomes were generally reported (i.e., reduction in grief symptom severity), with few studies reporting adverse events or negative outcomes. Conclusion: There is not a strong evidence base to guide clinical recommendations for applying psychedelics to the problem of grief at this time. Moving forward, psychedelic authors and researchers can explicitly situate their work (e.g., position, interests) to assist with interpretability of findings, and integrate theory from the field of grief studies, which may require collaborations with grief therapists and theorists to guide future work.