

Inside the Pentagon’s Alt-Medicine Mecca, Where the Generals Meditate - Alex3917
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/12/pentagon-alt-med-mecca/all/1

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rdl
I worked in (deployed) military hospitals from 2008-2010, so I saw both the
psych early-PTSD admits, and seriously injured people who may be at risk of
PTSD later.

The best PTSD research I've seen has been sponsored by MAPS (www.maps.org),
with MDMA-assisted psychotherapy. <http://www.maps.org/research/mdma/> MDMA,
the active component in the street drug E so beloved of ravers from the 1990s,
is actually useful in rapidly accelerating traditional psychotherapy, turning
a ~5 year treatment process into a 5-10 session process. This is both a huge
improvement in patient care outcome AND a huge cost savings.

If anyone is looking for an end-of-2011 501c3 donation, MAPS is one of the
best organizations out there for this kind of research, and operates on a very
efficient/lean budget, where the vast majority of money raised goes directly
to medical research. They publish financials online, and John Gilmore (Sun,
EFF, etc.) is one of the major donors.

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Alex3917
+1 for MAPS, they are probably my favorite non-profit today. The great thing
about their research is not only the results, which are unparalleled, but also
they are completely innovating on the methodology. The triple blind protocols
they're using are way better than anything the commercial pharma companies are
using today, and the fact that MAPS is able to get amazing results despite the
fact that they aren't using a bullshit methodology designed to make them look
good says volumes about the quality of what they are doing.

~~~
rdl
The MAPS conference in Oakland early this month was amazing too -- I shot
video for it, which should be on their website soon.

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Alex3917
I definitely will, I was at the San Jose one last year and I'm still going
through the video for that. I decided to go to horizons this year though
instead, and those talks are really good also:

<http://vimeo.com/horizons>

