The MAPS clinical research monitoring team arrives in Israel today for the Site Initiation visit for the MAPS-sponsored MDMA/PTSD pilot study at Beer Yakhov Mental Health Center in Tel Aviv, Israel, under the direction of Principal Investigator Moshe Kotler, former chief psychiatrist of the Israeli Defense Forces. The study will focus on individuals suffering from war-related PTSD.
The MAPS clincial monitoring team consists of MAPS President Rick Doblin, Ph.D., Clinical Research Associate Valerie Mojeiko, and volunteer clinical research expert Amy Emerson. Their job is to help the researchers prepare the study to fit the strict guidelines necessary for the data generated to be eligible for consideration by the FDA and the European Medicines Agency.
On October 25, Doblin and Lester Grinspoon, M.D., will join Israeli and Palestinian drug policy experts in Jerusalem to talk at the first Arab-Israeli Joint Conference on Peace and Drug Policy, sponsored by the Ale-Yarok (“Green-Leaf”) Party. The conference will focus on issues related to the cultural impacts of marijuana, its regulation, and its medical uses and research. While in Israel, MAPS staffers Rick Doblin and Valerie Mojeiko will also be conducting a “Psychedelic Emergency Services” training seminar for a team of volunteers organizing a rave near the Dead Sea.
