Toxicity of psychedelic drugs

Abstract The drugs of abuse market has been steadily increasing, and new classes of psychoactive substances appear every year, with potential addictive properties and side effects. Healthcare providers need to be aware of the toxicodynamic and toxicokinetic properties of these drugs for prevention, diagnosis and treatment of emergency cases. Serotonergic hallucinogens or psychedelics are strong psychoactive substances that act on the psychological state and influence the mood and several other processes in the brain. Among these, the use of the psychoactive natural substances has a long history in many cultures in sacred and religious rituals. Starting from the 1960s and 1970s, their popularity increased also as drugs of abuse. Serotoninergic hallucinogens include the classical psychedelic natural products containing N,N-dimethyltryptamine, psilocybin and psilocin, bufotenine, mescaline, lysergic acid amide, the synthetic hallucinogens as lysergic acid diethylamide, and the new hallucinogenic substances as tryptamine and phenethylamines derivatives, for which little is known regarding the toxicological properties and acute and chronic effects. This chapter provides a comprehensive update on serotoninergic hallucinogens, starting from their history and focusing on their classification, toxicokinetics, toxicodynamics, acute and chronic effects.