Exploring Psychedelic Support: Funding Progress Of Peer-Supported Harm Reduction

Results from Fireside Project’s (FP) follow-up survey of its psychedelic peer-supported helpline indicate the positive impact that just “having someone to talk to” has on people experiencing a difficult or bad trip.

It’s a virtual service for people presently struggling with a psychedelic experience or needing to work on a past one. Volunteer-peers are based all over the country, logging in through a secured phone system. And calls generally come in from larger, progressive cities like New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle.

The helpline team consists of about 110 supporters, with three shifts of four hours each per day and three to five volunteers per shift, depending on the estimated call volume, FP’s founder Joshua White explained.

See Also: Fireside's Vision - Expanding Support Beyond Harm Reduction in Psychedelics

“Sometimes you can have a really intense experience where traumas that you’ve experienced in the past come to the surface — parts of yourself that you’ve tried to bury are at the surface of your consciousness and you don’t really know to re-integrate all that so that you can function in the world,” he told Benzinga. “So being in that situation can be pretty high risk, but I didn’t expect it to be so high risk that someone said they may have called 911 or gone to the ER but for us, but that is what some percentage said they would do.”

FP also has a new “auto nudge” system that will expectedly get more replies from callers on a longitudinal basis, with follow-ups at three, six and 12 months post-call.

Financing The Model

As a charity, FP relies on philanthropy from high net worth individuals and foundations. Over time, the nonprofit hope to diversify the types of support it receives.

A recently published FP study could provide a basis for public funding.

“The federal government spends tens of millions of dollars a year in the suicide prevention lifeline. Now we have a study saying FP reduces trips to the ER, which are extremely expensive,” White says.

Study author Dr. Rachel Yehuda echoed that statement: The study doesn’t necessarily point at a solution to put in practice going forward, but rather shows some powerful damage control can be done.

“That if someone is having a bad experience and they call you while they’re having it or right after, you can talk them down and prevent this from becoming a kind of psychological emergency," she said.

The fact that trained volunteers receive FP calls suggests that it doesn’t necessarily have to be a trained clinician doing this kind of intervention. Which, in terms of feasibility and project cost, would make it considerably less expensive.

“This showed that you can train volunteers to do this work, and people calling will have good positive experiences with them. It doesn’t tell us much more than that, but that’s a big statement,” Yehuda says. “Because it means that you’re going to need to have access to somebody that you can call if you try to do psychedelics on your own.”

There’s a really strong argument that it will qualify for funding, White says, whether it be on the federal or state levels. As the legal status of psychedelics changes, he adds, more foundations will move into the space and offer much-needed multi-year grants.

Fireside Project operates the Psychedelic Peer Support Line providing free, confidential support by mobile app, phone and text message to people in the midst of psychedelic experiences or processing past ones. Access the line by phone and text at 62-FIRESIDE (623-473-7433) or through its mobile app.

Photo: Benzinga edit with photo Arcady, Negro Elkha and lrunups on Shutterstock.