Joe Moore: [00:00:00] Oh, there we are live. Hi, Jason Connor is joining us today at psychedelics today. Jason, how you doing today?

Dr Jason Konner: Nice to see you, Joe. I’m doing good.

Joe Moore: Good. I am happy to be connected with you. We got connected through the upcoming, um, conference at Penn that, uh, everybody should check out and, uh, your name popped out at me and, you know, not, it’s not often I see people affiliated with oncology involved in psychedelics.

I know of maybe one, uh, in vivo trial. Um, and you know, that’s it. So really excited to dig into your work and, uh, happy to learn about you. How do you, what are, what are you up to now? What’s your kind of, are you in practice anywhere in particular?

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, I, I recently actually left my clinical practice. Um, I was at Sloan Kettering for about 24 years.

Uh, until August where I [00:01:00] transitioned to a consultant role so that I can commit myself full-time to working, uh, in this, in this area. That’s outstanding.

Joe Moore: And you were a full-time oncologist for how long?

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, for, I, I came to Sloan Kettering in 2001 as a fellow shortly before nine 11. Uh, I did my fellowship and stayed on, uh, and became full faculty and, um, was there for over 20 years.

Outstanding.

Joe Moore: And how, how did psychedelics come on your radar of something, as something of interest?

Dr Jason Konner: Well, I. I would say the, you know, my first introduction to them was just a friend who had recommended I read Michael Pollan’s book. Mm-hmm. I think like so many others. Um, you know, and I read the book and I said, Hey, this, this actually sounds really interesting.

I didn’t know any of the [00:02:00] information that was presented in there. Mm-hmm. Uh, for me it was just another drug. I was a pretty straight, straight guy for most of my life, uh, and really had no, no understanding of what psychedelics were.

Joe Moore: Mm mm That’s interesting.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. Yeah. And it piqued my interest, but from my vantage point, I had no idea, you know, if, how or when I would ever have an experience or, or what that would look like.

Joe Moore: So

Dr Jason Konner: nothing really happened. Um, and then I had an experience, um, where my, my, you know, my dad passed away and, uh, witnessing his process. Uh, witnessing him having hallucinations, which he actually told me were the only easeful part of his journey, actually, a, a light sort of pinged on when I heard that. And, and, and he really got very connected with love.

He really just had an [00:03:00] amazing, um, journey of his own, just the dying process. Um, and, and after thinking about that experience and that, you know, in some way an altered, altered state of consciousness gave him a sense of peace, uh, that, that’s really the extent of my understanding of things That really piqued my interest.

And I reached out to some of the people at my hospital saying, Hey, you know, we should, we should study this. Uh, and, and I didn’t get, uh, much support around that. And so not much happened. Mm-hmm. Life went on. You know, being an oncologist is not easy. Comes with, uh, a lot of challenges, not just in how demanding it is and it’s extremely demanding, but in what we witness, you know, we witness some extremely difficult things.

Uh, and we, we, we walk a stride patients for many years and, uh, they go through just incredible hardship and, and often, [00:04:00] uh, will, will die of their disease. And, you know, we have very little support or training or understanding about what sort of personal work, uh, is required in order to be able to do that work, uh, and be supportive for patients and also be supportive for ourselves.

Um, and so that’s sort of, you know, lurking in the background with you when you’re a medical oncologist. And then COVID came and COVID was really difficult for a lot of people in the medical field. Uh. That brought me to, uh, the end of 2022. I was, uh, pretty burnt out. I was sort of emotionally in a bad place.

I was spiraling. And, uh, I developed an inguinal hernia and, uh, I scheduled a hernia surgery. And, uh, I actually took two weeks off of work for this hernia surgery. And as it was coming, you know, and they [00:05:00] said, oh, you’re gonna need to not do yoga for six weeks. And, uh, you know, you won’t be able to exercise.

And the days were getting dark. And it occurred to me I hadn’t taken two weeks off in, over a decade, and I really wanted to do something for myself. And I, I had no idea what to do. I was too dysphoric to plan a vacation. And a week, a week before my surgery, I was in a yoga class and I, I overheard a woman, you know, just a snippet of a conversation.

I just heard a woman say. Uh, ayahuasca retreat.

Joe Moore: Mm.

Dr Jason Konner: And I, I didn’t know quite what that was, but something just immediately shifted in me, you know, whatever darkness I was going through just lifted right away. Just hearing that I immediately knew that’s what I, uh, needed to do. Uh, and, and I literally went home and googled Ayahuasca retreat.

Uh, and the first thing that came up had, you know, 12,005 star reviews and I called them up and a week later I was in the jungle and [00:06:00] I kinda slipped through a portal there. And, um, you know, that was three years ago. And it, it, it, it absolutely, you know, transformed my life in, in some pretty massive, uh, pretty massive ways.

Um. You know, I had no idea what ayahuasca was or you know, what this was all about. But the week was just really transformative. I had some incredible high, some extremely difficult, challenging, uh, experiences, uh, and everything in between and, um, you know, really opened me up. Um, and, uh, after that I, I, you know, I, I, I did another retreat with mushrooms and, and, and really never looked back after that.

And

Joe Moore: mm-hmm.

Dr Jason Konner: I realized that first year, uh, working as a medical oncologist was just extraordinary. Uh, I really felt like I had a superpower. I was really able to show up for [00:07:00] my work in a way that I, I had never been able to do before. Uh, first off, my, my burnout had been both identified and, and lifted. And I say identified because I didn’t even know I was burned out.

I was miserable and didn’t understand why and described it to so many other things in my life. But the experience with the ayahuasca, um, really showed me exactly what was going on, and I understood things on a much deeper level. Uh, and, and in addition, I had, you know, a pretty profound fear of death prior to that.

Uh, and that was gone. Um, after my experience, which just is incredible, I never could have really imagined that. I think as oncologists so often we come into the profession because we see cancer and death as a bad thing. And, uh, we’re basically in there to sort ward it off or prevent it or, or push it As far you kick the can down the road as, as far as possible.

Uh, but we’re often [00:08:00] projecting our own fears, uh, into the room where with patients. Um, and suddenly, when, when, when that was resolved, uh, I was no longer doing that. And I, I think prior to my, my working with Ayahuasca, there seemed to be two options when you’re working with, with sick and dying patients, and one is to remain compassionate and, and connected and ultimately suffer, thes suffer the consequences, you know?

People cry in the bathrooms. They have bad dreams, they’re hurting, they, you know, they’re burned out. There’s all sorts of consequences to putting yourself out there like that. And the other option seem to be just keep patients at an arm’s distance as a form of self-protection. Uh, and, and that also doesn’t really serve anybody very well.

And I, I think with Ayahuasca, I saw a third path, uh, one where I could remain, uh, connected, compassionate, interested, present, [00:09:00] uh, and not suffer the consequences because I had this new perspective on basically everything, uh, that served me so well. And it was extraordinary. And, and I heard from patients just amazing feedback.

You know, there, the, there was the, the depth of my relationships was just, uh, just very evidently, uh, richer. Uh, and, you know, patients were, were really feeling connected and I was able to have. Discussions about spirituality with them in, in a genuine way. Uh, not, not preaching anything, but just being able to kind of understand where patients are at with, with some of their, um, more existential questions.

Where prior to all this, you know, I came prior to Ayahuasca, I was really an atheist, materialist, rationalist scientist. And, you know, if there’s not evidence for it, I’m not, I’m not buying it. Uh, and, and suddenly there was evidence for a lot. And so I was, I was able to really [00:10:00] genuinely have I, the, these sorts of, uh, conversations and connections with patients and bring up a lot of material that, that previously had not really been addressed.

And it was really deeply appreciated by patients. And, you know, it was amazing and I was just so grateful and, and it just absolutely changed my life. Um, but there was a deep call in me to do more, um, and to, uh. To share this in some way. I mean, how could I not, I just found this, this unbelievable, uh, type of healing.

Uh, and I’m surrounded by people who are really stuck in the muck, um, of, you know, going through cancer or, or supporting someone with cancer, uh, in the place of sort of the, of a narrow focus or of, of an EE egoic mind. I don’t mean that in a, in a state of self inflation, but, you know, in sort of a, a, a, a narrowed [00:11:00] a view of, of, of everything.

So I, I think the first year it was really, yes, this is amazing. I’m so grateful, I’m so happy I can do this like never before. And then the next year was just like, I can’t be the only one. I, I, I just can’t be the only one, you know? And, and I was able to, over time just. It was clear and clear to me that there’s a certain amount of, of, of, of suffering and grief and, and trauma and, and discomfort that’s going to come along with cancer.

I mean, cancer is horrible. There’s a certain amount of pain that that’s going to happen no matter what. But then there’s this layered suffering on top of that in terms of anxiety about the future and, and, you know, unfelt feelings, unresolved or unaddressed traumas. And there, there, there’s so much that can be addressed that we’re really not doing a good job as a, as a field of [00:12:00] addressing.

And so much of what we do is spending time with these things. And so it became eventually impossible for me to do what I was doing with a clear mind, uh, without, and knowing what I know of what is possible and not be able to find a way to help, uh. Offer that, or bring that or, or, or support people in, in finding, uh, you know, similar relief.

Joe Moore: Well, thank you. That was lovely. And what a journey. So, um, yeah, who said hernias weren’t a good thing?

Dr Jason Konner: I never got it fixed. I’m very grateful for it every day.

Joe Moore: So I, um, there’s so many threads to pick up on here. So you, you came out of school, they’re like, here, here you go. Here’s your patients you gotta work [00:13:00] with.

Help invest to the best of your ability. But, you know, through. Chemotherapies and other adjunctive therapies. Right. It’s not necessarily like, how do we make them feel good or at least a little better. Um, not like we really can necessarily, but you know, that’s kind of what chaplaincy is about. That’s what palliative care is kind of about.

And and you’re saying you didn’t really have those skills, right? Yeah. Like from training.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. And. I mean, I, I think some of the newer training programs give it a little bit more lip service and, and there’s a little more attention to it, but, you know, not nearly enough. Um, and, and I think I came to appreciate over the couple of decades that I’ve done this, but especially over the last couple of years, just how important the relational aspect is of our job as medical oncologist.

I mean, it is absolutely such a cornerstone of the healing process. Um, and, and I know that because my patients tell me this. Mm-hmm. But at the same time, we [00:14:00] work within a system that does not support, that does not reward, that does not give space for, that, does not give training for that. Uh, and it’s, it’s to everybody’s loss

Joe Moore: because

Dr Jason Konner: there’s so much that can be gained from that.

But, but so many docs don’t necessarily, not only is there not the time for that of support, but also the capacity. How do you show up as a, as a supportive doctor and. These systems that we have in place are really, really thin. And, and, and I don’t mean my hospital in particular. I mean the whole, the whole system.

I, I think sometimes you think you get a cancer diagnosis and suddenly there’s a psychiatrist and a social worker and a chaplain and all these people in your corner who are gonna be there. But it’s really not that easy. Um, a lot of people don’t have access to all these things and they don’t have time.

You know, very often people with cancer are working full-time jobs and mm-hmm. They have a really demanding schedule in their lives. It’s barely, [00:15:00] they’re barely able to keep up with what they need to do to stay alive. Um, and, you know, many people are not open to having a psychiatrist and many people go to a psychiatrist and don’t benefit from it because I think very often what happens is patients are diagnosed with a reactive depression, uh, and they’re given an SSRI.

It has marginal, if any, benefits because they’re not necessarily depressed. They’re, they’re, they’re struggling with meaning, they’re struggling with unlabeled trauma. They’re, they’re living with grief. There. There’s, there’s so much that this, the system does not even give lip service to. Um, that really, there’s so much potential for deep healing, uh, because these things are just lurking throughout the journey.

Mm-hmm.

Joe Moore: And

Dr Jason Konner: also just the capacity to be present. You know, when you, [00:16:00] when you get a cancer diagnosis, and I’m a cancer survivor myself, and, you know, I can, I can speak to this personally, not only as a witness, but something changes. There’s a light switch that flicks on and suddenly there’s this uncertainty about the future.

And there’s, you know, these existential questions are just there. Am I gonna make it to next year? Am I going to grow old? Am I going to. You know, see this future that I once thought I was going to see. And um, you know, so often we say, okay, well, you know, you just gotta live in the present. But that’s a lot easier said than done for somebody, uh, who is living understandably in a really contracted state of fear and pain.

And it’s just, um, yeah. So we, as I was saying, very, very seldom do patient, are patients able to access these services. And when they do, they often don’t serve them. Um, you know, they go to support groups and those are invariably harmful. I’ve, I don’t know if I’ve ever met a patient Oh, really? [00:17:00] Harmed by going to a support group.

Yeah. Because what happens is, you know, they’re recently diagnosed. Really un looking for community. They’re looking for support. They don’t know where to find it. They’re looking for peers and they go to support group. And somebody who’s really way worse off than they are is there saying, yes, I was once like you, and this look at me now.

And it’s really awful. Um, and it’s, it’s traumatic. It’s traumatic. I, I, I stopped referring anybody to those after, after a while because it’s invariably, uh, just an awful thing. So, very often as medical oncologists, we are doing the work of the para, the, you know, that is normally ascribed to psychiatrists, chaplains, palliative care doctors.

This is our bread. That’s what we do. You know, we’re managing pain, we’re managing anxiety. We’re sometimes treating depression, um, you know, as best we can. And, and that’s where a lot of the relational aspect of this comes into [00:18:00] play too. I mean, if you’re, you’re doing this well, but. The way things are moving in medicine that, you know, most people who are hired are administrators.

And you know, most of what we do at this point is on the computer for the sake of billing and lawyers and our numbers are being crunched and our RVs are being measured. And, you know, it’s, it’s hard to really go in and, and give space for a patient to express themselves in a, in a meaningful way. And, and what patients are going through is just like horrific.

You know, we, we tell them, oh, you’ve got cancer. The C word, you know, carries a ton of weight. It’s really just like a very powerful energy. Oh. And you know, we’re going to, you know, take apart one of your major organs or, or, or parts of your sexual apparatus. We’re just gonna tear you open, push you back together, dump you with chemo, maybe radiate you and maybe you’ll live and maybe you won’t.

I mean, that’s like a lot at once. It’s a lot.

Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

Dr Jason Konner: And so we’re, [00:19:00] we’re. The complexities of just the medical care are hard enough to keep up with. Um, because it’s, a lot of patients come in, they have multiple comorbidities, they’re on multiple medications, they have really complex diseases, and there’s a lot.

So it’s, it’s, um, it’s a difficult situation for, for, for patients, for families, for caregivers, um, for healthcare workers and for survivors. You know, so often when somebody is done with all this, you know, we say, oh, okay, you, you had your breast cancer, we took off the breast, we gave the chemo, we did the radiation.

Here’s some hormones. You’re done. You’re statistically gonna likely live. You know, and we, we mark it off as a success. But very often this is where a journey begins, you know, for a patient like, what the hell just happened? You know, what just happened? What happened to my [00:20:00] hair, my, my beauty, my nerve endings, my energy, my sexuality, my relationships, my job, my life.

And so, you know, the, the, and these are the survivors. Um, you know, so often, so, so there’s so many layers to this, so many layers. I could, I, I could, I could go on about, you know, what, what, what we bear witness to, but it’s, it, it’s a lot. And, and we need better tools for this. We need better discussions about this.

We need a ton more support, uh, for this. And so after discovering the, you know what psychedelics. Can do. Um, I’m just like amazed and I say, oh my God. And then you go and you look at some of the data from, from Roland Griffith’s work and, and at NYU and, and Yale and UCLA and you, you say, oh, well, there’s actually some data [00:21:00] to say that patients with terminal cancer, their existential distress and anxiety is substantially eased by one or two sessions with psilocybin.

And it’s like, we should be screaming this from the mountaintops, right? Mm. This is big news. This is, this is what we’re doing, right? This is, this is what is the b story of what’s going on. This is why we’re doing everything we’re doing. Shouldn’t we be talking about this? And so, I, I, I, I really thought we’d be.

Celebrating this as a field, and I would go to these conferences and there’d be absolutely no discussion of this at all in the medical oncology, surgical oncology community. There’s no discussion of it. None. You know, there’s a little bit in the, in the psychiatry community, which is great. There’s some interest, some interest, you know, it’s getting there.

But in terms of there are these amazing data, but then there’s the reality on the ground, right? What is it going to [00:22:00] take for these data to make it to patients, right? Hmm. Or is this just some abstraction, or is this just a way that we’re trying to get FDA approval for some of the, you know, new pharmaceutical variants of these medicines?

And so initially I’m like, oh, well let, let me participate in clinical. We need more data. We need more data. But no, I mean, we’ve got, we’ve got data we need, we need bridges. We need action. One of my,

Joe Moore: um, lady I kind of consider to be my big sister. Yeah. She um, she kind of, I think for years led derm oncology at uh, where the hell was she, one of the fancy Boston hospitals and uh, I think she’s moving to Houston now.

But when in conversations with her, the level of kind of flexibility oncologists have in terms of using really kind of far out things, you know? Okay. There’s like one [00:23:00] case study in the literature that says this, this other, like the standard of care and everything else we’re trying just doesn’t seem to be working.

Like we have the privilege of using this kind of thing. And there’s this really interesting edge case, Jason, that happened in um, uh, where was it? Denver When Denver decriminalized mushrooms. Um, I think it was an oncologist actually prescribed psilocybin under the, at that point, Trump, right. To try Act Federal Right.

To try act because the person was stage three, stage four, like on his way out. And, and this patient actually went and did like a big press release about it. Like, I believe in this so much. Um, it’s not gonna save my life, but it’s gonna really help me with, um, the, you know, have a full life for the next, you know, weeks or months.

And I just love that case. And I, I wonder kind of your perspectives on this kind of, you know, we have the federal right to try Oregons kind of working on some Right. To try [00:24:00] stuff. Like do you have any kind of opinions on this kind of Right to try thing?

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, I mean, I. Right to try is a very bureaucratic process.

Yeah. There’s a lot of lip service about this as a political talking point, but in reality it is so rarely applicable. It so rarely helps any individual because the amount of work required, uh, by the system. In order to allow this to happen, you basically have to write a whole new clinical trial for one person with a low likelihood of it coming to fruition.

It’s actually easier to write a clinical trial, which I’ve done. I have made clinical trials for individuals, and I would rather do that than the right to try, because at least you have a commitment from a manufacturer or something. You, you, you have some confidence it’s going to happen. Mm-hmm.

Joe Moore: So

Dr Jason Konner: it in real, in the reality, right, to try almost never comes to fruition largely because [00:25:00] somebody’s in this situation, they need this sooner than the six months that it takes.

To go through the bureaucracy. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s a abstraction.

Joe Moore: Right. And not all that meaningful. And that’s interesting. So clinical trial might actually be more interesting in, in like, how do we, how do we streamline access that way? The Canadians have like the whole federal petition process. I’m sure you’ve seen that a little bit, but it’s, their success rate is getting lower.

Um, but that’s le leading to a lot of lawsuits for the federal government to have to answer to up there. Um, yeah. Well that’s a really clever and interesting angle. Thanks for, thanks for that. And I, go ahead.

Dr Jason Konner: No, no, no. Please go on. Uh,

Joe Moore: so, you know, uh, there’s, there’s a lot I want to get into with you. This is so interesting.

I’m, I’m curious about insights from your own experiences. Like, do you, do you feel like you perhaps think [00:26:00] more clearly? I’m kind of removing the humanity part, but like, when you’re actually developing treatment plans for folks and administering the treatments, are you thinking perhaps more clearly or feeling like you’re en engaging with the patient’s condition in a more intelligent way?

You know, do are, are you feeling like you have more insight into how to approach it?

Dr Jason Konner: That’s a good question. Um, yes and no. Uh, you know, I, I think that I came to this work at a point in my career where I, I’m sort of at the top of my game cognitively about all this. Um, I do think that. Uh, this work did enable me to be more creative about what sort of clinical trials we could do.

Mm-hmm. Um, more creative about scientific questions, more helpful in advisory boards and things like that. Um, you know, so, so, and also [00:27:00] your mind is just clearer. You’re just less cluttered. Mm-hmm. Um, so I would say that my, my capacity creative was definitely enhanced. Mm-hmm. Uh, but I think there was also just more room for that, because there’s less clutter from distress about the other things that are part of the job.

Joe Moore: Hmm.

Yeah. Well, I love that. That’s cool. I, there’s this whole field of study happening. Um, this group Center for Minds is leading the charge there. They’ve been working on creative problem solving with psychedelics and trying to, you know, get to the neurology of it. I think. I hope for an ecosystem of groups looking at that kind of thing.

Uh, so we can have some more actionable insights sooner. But I, I do wonder what we’re gonna find when we look at that. Like how are we actually potentially solving problems quicker or more creatively? Um, yeah, I have no

Dr Jason Konner: doubt there’s something there. I have no doubt there’s something there. Yeah.

Joe Moore: Um, all right, before we go back to oncology and [00:28:00] psychedelics, this idea that I have been kind of toying with for a while, and I think oncology is actually uniquely suited for this.

So we have evidence-based treatments, right? Sometimes we don’t have enough evidence-based treatments, um, or those just, they just aren’t working for whatever reason. Um, and then there’s this concept we’ve been kind of playing with here called, um. Evidence informed, uh, decision framework where we’re like, okay, like we’re kind of stuck.

We don’t know, like what’s happening over in these outer territories, and can we infer things laterally from those? Mm-hmm. Uh, my friend court wings always like referring me to this, this kind of evidence informed. Is that a, is that a thinking style you have to work with in your practice at all? This kinda lateral jump?

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. I haven’t, I haven’t heard that term, but I, I like it. Um, and, and it, it is descriptive of what much of, much of what I, I, I do, I think it depends to some degree on, on, [00:29:00] um, which field you’re in. So for instance, in, in breast cancer, um, there’s so much data, so much data that as that describes. Almost every scenario of every patient at every stage of their disease.

And that’s largely because we have pharmaceutical companies who are investing in trials to try to, you know, get a foothold in every point of the disease. So there’s, and there are these trial that have thousands and thousands of patients. Mm-hmm. And they look for. You know, statistical significance in these groups, and you could look for subtle differences.

Uh, and then the arguments is made. Well, we have, you know, so many hundreds of thousands of cases per year that each incremental benefit is justifiable. So, um, you know, you have those fields that are, that are very data-driven. Um, and then in, in my field, I, I worked as a gynecologic medical oncologist. So, uh, my patients had gynecologic cancers, almost all of which were, all [00:30:00] of which are really rare cancers.

And so, uh, you’re very often in a, in a data free zone, uh, where you need to be evidence informed. I, I think what often happens in, in these cancers is, uh, there is a bit of a gold rush for the pharmaceutical industry to get data, but very often they’re trying to get their, uh, drugs earlier and earlier into the disease process.

So they get a little data that, yes, it works in recurrence, let’s move it to the front. And that, ’cause that’s when they’re, they’re gonna get the most use of their drug. So for the first line or two of therapy, there’s going to be some standards of care. Uh, but very often, you know, I would’ve patients who would have, you know, 10, 15, 20 lines of therapy.

So for the, you know, number three through 20, uh, it’s, it’s, um, evidence informed. Uh, and that’s where the creativity and where the art of medicine, uh, really comes into play. And the relational is absolutely critical for that as well, because you really need [00:31:00] to get a good sense of patients, uh, preference and, and needs.

And, and there’s a dance about understanding, um, what they’re capable of and what their toxicities are. Because very often, mm-hmm. You know, they may wanna underplay one thing because they want a certain drug or, you know, you have to really feel out what their preferences are, what, how not to do harm, how to work for them.

Uh, so there, there’s a lot of, um, you know, the, this is the art of medicine plays deep in these settings. Um, and, and ironically the more, the more we know scientifically, the bigger that field of data free zone gets as patients are, are living longer.

Joe Moore: Yeah. I was chatting with,

Dr Jason Konner: um,

Joe Moore: I think it might’ve been an oncologist recently about that, or, or just the new diseases that are happening post-treatment because people are living, oh, you’ve survived [00:32:00] 30 years after your chemo.

It’s novel. Like people, we don’t have data sets for people living to a hundred after having, um, these treatments. So it’s a fascinating area of study. Um. Mind-boggling levels of complexity. It’s like, like you, you’re not gonna find a big cohort you can study that’s like that, you know, you’re not finding thousands of people with that, you know, situation.

Yeah. So it’s gonna get more and more complex, I imagine, as people continue to age here.

Dr Jason Konner: Absolutely. Absolutely. And yes, what you, what you bring up is a really interesting point. I’ve thought about this a lot, about these new disease states that never really existed. I mean, you look at something like graft, graft versus host disease, which is a consequence of, of bone marrow transplant sometimes.

And, and that never existed before. We had bone marrow transplants and suddenly it’s this whole new disease entity. And, and people specialize in this. And, and it’s just interesting as physicians to be treating diseases that we’ve sort [00:33:00] of cre, you know, created, I mean, they, they come from helping people, but also we, we’ve created them.

And, and there’s something really strange about that on some level, just in turn, you know, almost existentially from our perspective. Hmm. So it’s interesting, but, um, unusual.

Joe Moore: So in your interest in psychedelics and, and, um, knowledge of assorted chemotherapies, radiation, other interventions, are you, are you curious about or hopeful about assorted psychedelics or psycho plastics neuroplastic to actually recover people’s, um, nervous systems in some way?

Like particularly you’re kind of talking about like blunted kind of nerves earlier or post-treatment, and I wonder about your perspectives there or hopes there.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, I mean, it’s a great question and, and I, I so often get the question about what are the, the biologic [00:34:00] effects of, of these agents going, going to be, uh.

And the need in terms of, uh, peripheral nervous system. Neurogenesis in oncology is tremendous. We have so many chemotherapies, uh, and targeted therapies as well that are damaging to the nerve endings. Uh, and that really impact quality of life. Uh, and these things are hard to graph. Um, and, but when you’re with patients and you hear how it affects their lives, you see, you know, how, how substantial an issue this really is.

And the fact that we can see, um, increased growth, uh, of synapses that we see regeneration of nerves in the brain, um, with some of these substances is another thing that I would think the medical field will be shouting from the rooftops. Um, because we’re all taught in medical school, the brain, you know, maxes out at age 24 and [00:35:00] then, then slowly atrophies.

Uh, over the next several decades, which is kind of a depressing thought. You do see brains shrink as the, on the scans as patients get older. So suddenly we have something that seems to beef up the, uh, the good cells and the good parts of the brain. Uh, and it does open up the question, well, what are we doing for the rest of the, uh, nervous system?

And this is something, you know, Paul Stat certainly talks about. I know that his sta stat stack, uh, he thinks a lot about how that might affect, um, peripheral neuropathy and, and, and, and nerve endings. He talks a lot about this tap test, uh, that he looks at with people in the STEM stack, which, you know, is a surrogate perhaps for, for, uh, peripheral nerve function.

But this is something we really need to stu I mean, this is so understudied. Mm-hmm. Um, and, and the medications that we have, uh, to treat this, you know, the, um. Gabapentin [00:36:00] and Cymbalta and, you know, they’re, they’re, they don’t actually improve the problem at all. They blunt some of the discomfort. They do nothing for numbness.

They can blunt some of the pain, but they have their own side effects. Uh, and this is such a huge need that it needs to be studied. Uh, and, and, and I think there can be fairly straightforward studies to look at what happens to, you know, the synapses of peripheral nerves when they’re exposed to psilocybin and line span, like, what’s, what’s, what’s going on?

Show us. Uh, and I think that might generate some interest in that. Um, but I think it’s hard for me to say that it does or does not do that clinically because that’s hard to study. Mm-hmm. Certainly from a, you know, one person’s perspective, these are very slow growing nerves. You know, the peripheral nerves that can be a meter long, especially in the legs.

So axonal regrowth can take months to years. So it, it is hard to, to study the clinical effects of [00:37:00] these things.

Joe Moore: I remember Paul kind of pointing to a lot of Japanese studies. I just wonder if they’re like looking at mushrooms in a different way, or like they’re looking at these in, you know, Petri dishes as opposed to in humans and kind of doing that inference to humans.

And, you know, I it’s always an interesting one.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, yeah. Well they, you know, certainly in East Asia, they have, uh, a wider appreciation for what mushrooms can do. Uh, and they also use much higher doses of medicinal mushrooms. Uh, so I, I think the medical community in, in Japan has, you know, certainly embraced mushrooms just as a therapeutic modality.

More, more than we have, uh, here. So you, does the

Joe Moore: science seem global? Like, does it, so I, I remember kind of wading through all sorts of weird, murky. International science, I don’t know, snarkiness, maybe like inability to accept other countries data. You’re like, oh, the Germans do [00:38:00] this, or the Russians do this, Chinese do this.

So it’s not real. And like, you know, I found that like not a helpful approach. Like, okay, what’s here that’s actually a value and how do we go forward? Like what can we actually take from this, even if it’s not our standards? Yeah, yeah. Is there a good cooperation?

Dr Jason Konner: Yes and no. I mean, it is totally subjective.

Um, you know, when you see a European study that shows something novel, you could say, okay, this is great. Or if, if it’s goes against your bias, you could say, well, this was in a totally different population. We really can’t accept this. So people tend to accept or discard them based on their own, their own biases is what I’ve observed.

Joe Moore: Mm. Yeah,

that’s interesting and helpful. Yeah, thanks for that. And I, you know, I, um, I’m particularly helpful or hopeful, sorry, uh, about what IGA might hold here in terms of what I’ve seen on Google Lens [00:39:00] Labs and this kind of just extreme length of neuroplasticity, like four plus weeks, she had to actually terminate the trial before it hit the end of that window.

Um, so they’re like, ah, it just keeps going. All right. Uh, stop. It was only four weeks and it could have theoretically been a lot longer. Like, we don’t really know, but it’s, um, it’s really hopeful to me. Um, we’ll see. Yeah,

Dr Jason Konner: I mean, I began, is really having his moment. Uh, and, and I think that I. It doesn’t necessarily have the stigmas that some of the other substances do, so, uh mm-hmm.

It

Joe Moore: seems

Dr Jason Konner: to be

Joe Moore: welcome. Yeah. Rick Barry did it.

Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, I’m going to the

Iboga Summit on Friday that’s in Aspen, which should be really interesting and I’ll come back with some findings there. It’s kind of like a, a private, kind of like Texas influenced big conference. Fascinating. To see what they want to talk about.

Dr Jason Konner: Amazing. Amazing. Yeah. I mean, that, that would be incredible to look at. I know people are starting to microdose [00:40:00] ibogaine and, um, you know, the different, different ways of, uh, working with this medicine. So who knows? It’s fascinating. It really is.

Joe Moore: I’ll speak to it in terms of microdosing and I, it’s a very curious experience.

Uh, I don’t know how to characterize it all that well yet, but it’s fascinating. Um, and I, I think edgy, so be careful, everybody, like talk to a bunch of doctors about this before you jump in. Um, ’cause there is a cardio, you know, cardiac risk there. Um, and we don’t want anybody to get hurt.

Yeah.

Agreed. So, um, another interesting thing about this kind of, would you call that peripheral neuropathy?

Um, when people just aren’t having really good nerve function at the end of the nervous system? Yeah. Um, we had this really interesting case that we worked on. Um, a friend kind of, um, did the work. It got published. Um, she’s been really public about this from the patient [00:41:00] experience. Lynn Watkins is her name.

You know, couldn’t move her, her toes for super long time. Couldn’t drive, couldn’t use Uten, TILs, 10 out of 10 pain forever. You know, kind of, um, a surgical accident that just compounded and compounded, compounded. And we did, uh, my friend did this treatment and six. Six weeks of prep, then a dosing session, and um, she could move her toes again.

She could do that like PT towel test where you’re actually moving. She, she couldn’t, had never done, you know, in ages and in utensils. Now she can drive herself to the store, go shopping on her, all this stuff. Fascinating. Um, and, uh, everybody should check out that story. I, I wish I had the article where I could like, cite the paper for you, but it’s, um, if you’re curious, I can send that your way, but it’s, I would be curious.

Yeah, I’ll, um, I’ll dig in. I’m a, I’m a board member, founding board member at the Psychedelics and Pain Association, and we do a lot of really interesting stuff, like bring people together, top folks in science and medicine, and actually patient populations are trying to bring [00:42:00] patients together to say what, you know, I’m stuck.

I haven’t had help in five years. The stuff they give me is horrible and I don’t feel progress. What do I do? Yeah. And in some cases, decades. Right? Um mm-hmm. But the hope is how do we just keep people from using, um, opioids for decades of their life when they don’t, when there could be alternatives. Yeah.

Um, hopefully. Fingers crossed here. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Um, do you, so sorry for that tangent on my stuff. But the idea here around like this intersection of psychedelics and oncology is super interesting and broad ranging, right? It’s some people might die, some people. Family might be more impacted than they are.

Um, and I’m seeing a lot more stuff around, okay, I’m gonna get the treatment, but maybe my spouse who’s gonna survive me also should get a treatment. Um, yeah. And she can maybe show up better for me.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, caregivers have it rough, um, [00:43:00] because they, they can’t really complain

Joe Moore: mm-hmm. In

Dr Jason Konner: some way.

Uh, and yet they’re giving a, they’re very often giving a lot, and it’s not their life who’s on the line, but it’s their, their partner. Um, and very little, you know, as, as much as we’re glossing over a lot of the issues of the patients, you know, we’re, we’re not even trying for it. It’s very often, you know mm-hmm.

For the caregivers, uh, because it’s just too, it’s just too much that we just don’t have the bandwidth for it. But the way that, that. Their lives are affected, um, both during, uh, a patient’s discourse and in the aftermath, if they lose their loved one. I mean, it’s just absolutely horrific. So yes, absolutely bringing them in.

Um, I believe there, there is a trial going gone at, at Sunstone. Mm-hmm. Um, with, with partner MDMA, uh, joint sessions, [00:44:00] uh, for caregivers, which I, I think is terrific. Um, but yes, I, I, I, I think that when, when somebody is diagnosed with cancer, their whole family is affected. Uh, it has such a ripple effect on, um, you know, not just the spouse, but, but children and siblings and coworkers, and I mean.

I’m, I’m, I’m not suggesting that absolutely everybody needs to do this, but there’s an enormous, uh, enormous amount of suffering and, and grief, uh, and, and, and trauma that can be really helped, uh, for some people, uh, affected by this. Uh, and it’s yes, definitely goes beyond the patient for sure. Uh, even Pat, even people who are at high risk for cancer, and that’s a, that’s a huge population or living with that specter, um, who actually haven’t had the diagnosis, or people who have, um, you know, like a low grade prostate cancer and they’re [00:45:00] undergoing, watchful waiting and they, you know, it, it may become a problematic cancer or may be something that they can live a normal life with.

And every six months they have to have a rectal, you know, transrectal biopsy. It’s horrible. You know, there’s, there’s a lot of people at risk for cancer. Who I think really could benefit by doing this sort of work.

Joe Moore: Hmm.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. Um,

Joe Moore: so the way you phrased it was interesting to me. ’cause there’s, there’s this idea that we’re just very individual things, not part of systems, but I think like almost we’re, we’re more part of systems than we are individuals.

And kind of the systems awareness is kind of a cool insight that I think often comes from, well, can come from psychedelics and, you know, help us. ’cause we, we come from this hyper individualist thing and so how do we Yeah. Become more communal and orientation, maybe not communal system, just community aware.

Um, [00:46:00]

Dr Jason Konner: you know, it’s funny because I, that’s almost like a metaphor for, for cancer itself. You know, you have this group of cells that are constantly communicating and working for the greater good of the organism. And one of the really amazing things about cells is that when something is not right, they stop replicating.

Joe Moore: You

Dr Jason Konner: know, there’s a, there’s a self-check system is P 53 that before cell divides, P 53 says, wait a second, let’s just take a look. Let’s make sure this makes sense. And, uh, and cancer’s p you know, P 53 is, is one of the most, um. You know, most frequently, um, you know, TP 53 gene is very frequently, uh, disrupted in, in cancer.

So, you know, they’re just sort of growing and taking and expanding without really taking in the signals from the community. Hmm. And, and giving out signals. It’s sort of this very self-serving action. Um, [00:47:00] so it, it’s almost as if these cells have been cut off from, from community and from this, uh, sense that you’re describing.

So it’s a, you know, happens on, on the macro and on the micro.

Joe Moore: Hmm. Yeah. That’s interesting. Um, so what are, what are some frontiers that you’re really interested in here around this, this intersection of psychedelics and oncology?

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. I mean, I, I’m really starting with the basics here.

Joe Moore: Mm-hmm.

Dr Jason Konner: Like I can foresee.

The end, but I, I really need to start at the beginning, um, by just starting with the messaging and the education and I, I think there’s such limited understanding, uh, of what psychedelics, uh, are and, and can do and, and how they can be worked with and, and what the risks and potential benefits are, and how they can potentially help pe, you know, the cancer ecosystem.

So [00:48:00] I think just talking about it really, uh, is the most important thing initially. Um, because, you know, I, I, I would love a time where people have a healthy relationship with death and, and, and live for love rather than out of fear. And, and, you know, our ICUs are not crowded with people like, desperately trying to get that last chemo and that last breath and filled with tubes.

And I mean, there’s, you know, there’s so many low hanging fruits, um, that, that, um. You know, I, I can go on for hours talking about all, all the things that I, I think could be improved. Um, but I, I really think just getting the message out and, and giving people permission to even think about this and ask these questions and talk about it and say, Hey, this, this is something that could really help, um, is, is really what we, what we need.

Um. I, I remember finding out recently that only [00:49:00] something like 18% of Oregonians knew that psilocybin assisted therapy was even legal, which is, you know, you think about Oregon, it’s so far ahead of the curve and, and everything, but, you know, just, just starting the conversation. So I’m trying not to think too big and too far ahead with all of this.

But certainly, I mean, if I, if I were pressed to answer this question, uh, I would say two really big things that I would like to see studied. Um, are the, uh, biologic effects and the financial effects, because I think these are things that would get people to notice the biologic effects we get patients to notice and the financial effects we get the system to notice.

And I think that, you know, very often the question is, oh, well these, you know, you can’t make any money selling a natural product, and how are we gonna make space for this and blah, blah, blah. And you know, I, I think, I think that the system as a whole [00:50:00] would be incredibly, uh, benefited. You know, if, if I have some patients who’ve worked with psychedelics, you know, when I was in practice and when I see them, it was a totally different story.

You know, we wouldn’t be going over and over the same questions and the same, you know, what’s gonna happen to me? And, and I looked at my tumor markers and they look horrible. And my creatinine, they, we would talk about their lives and their plans and their dreams and really just, you know, we talk about their cancer care, but it, you know, we would not have to scrutinize every little thing and worry about the future.

And, and I really think I could see twice the number of patients in a day, uh, who were taking mushrooms than, than patients who are not, and all of us get home happier. I mean, and so I, I think that there’s such a cluttered, you know, system right now that can be uncluttered and happier and healthier. Um, and I think the, the potential for, that’s tremendous.

And I mentioned ICUs. We spend so much money, so many healthcare [00:51:00] dollars on end of end of life care, meaning the last two weeks of life. You know, and, and I think that comes from people who have not examined their relationship with, with death, uh, and who are, who are living in fear and, you know, fighting for every, every, every moment in a way that’s really not realistic or in the best interest.

And so of, and this is true also for doctors, you know, um, there’s a time in a a, in a patient’s journey who has advanced disease, where there comes a time where treatment is gonna do more harm than good. And so often patients receive treatment beyond that point. Uh, and I think that that’s because of, um, you know, the doctors who are not comfortable saying no, which is a hard thing to do.

And the patients who say, well, I’m not going to give up. You know, I must, I must fight. And even though we know that so often in that situation, lives are [00:52:00] shortened by giving too much chemo, complications are increased, more time is spent in the hospital. But still these things are done for, um, reasons that have more to do with, with trauma than with, you know, rational medical decisions.

So, so I think that, you know, people who are making peace with death would not be ending up, you know, with multiple tubes in the ICU doing unreasonable things. And I think anybody in medicine who has witnessed this, knows how absolutely horrific it is and, uh, devastating to patients and families. Uh, and if we could stop this madness, not by mandating it, but inviting people into a space where they can, you know, make choices that are, that are not based on, on terror.

You know, we would have a better system. And I mean, there’s so many, so many areas, there’s so much suffering that goes on in this journey. There’s so many areas that can be helped. [00:53:00] But those are a couple of big ones. And, and so biologic effects, you know, I see this in a couple of different ways. Uh, I think it’s not realistic to say, okay, well if you have cancer and you take a mushroom, your cancer is going to get better because mushrooms treat cancer.

I mean, that’s obviously absurd. Um, but I do think that, um, working with psychedelics or doing inner work in general can, uh, help people, um, improve their bodies and their minds in a variety of ways, uh, and perhaps be better able to, um. To go ahead and, and undergo treatment and allow the body to do its thing.

I think in the last 20 years, the major, um, advance that we’ve seen in oncology has been cancer immunotherapy, which has been an, an extraordinary transformative era. And one of the incredible thing, there’s a variety of, you know, huge blockbuster medicines that have been made. [00:54:00] Uh, and, but most of ’em don’t actually do anything directly against tumors.

What they do is they basically give permission to the immune system to do its job, and it’s a testament to the unbelievable capacity to our bodies have to heal themselves. Uh, and that sometimes there are just barriers to doing that. And I think that’s also a nice metaphor for the psychedelic journey as well.

But, uh, I think that if we are to, you know, uh, clear our channels and clean our vessels, uh. Then we’re going to be better able to make use of some of these natural, uh, healing modalities that are, that are there for us. Um, and I think when we’re cutting down on polypharmacy, meaning, you know, if we’re not taking all these opiates and gabapentin and SSRIs and benzodiazepines, and I can assure you that there are tons of patients who are on enormous lists of these medications, uh, that are, you know, marginally [00:55:00] at best benefiting from them.

And I think when these are removed from most, most patients lists, they’re gonna be living better, happier, healthier, and they’re gonna be more able to receive, um, you know, the benefits of their treatments. Mm-hmm. I have through the years, heard a variety of anecdotes about healing of cancers. Uh, and they’re mostly related, almost completely related to people who have worked with ayahuasca.

Joe Moore: Mm-hmm. And

Dr Jason Konner: I think that’s something that needs to be looked at. Um. I’m really curious about that. I’m really open to the possibility of that. You know, part of my interest in all this actually started with this patient who, uh, really incredible story. She had Ricardo ovarian cancer. She was, uh, getting seventh line, uh, chemotherapy topotecan, and it was sort of having a marginal benefit for, for her.

And she actually went down to South America to, to spend two weeks at a retreat with a, with a shaman and, uh, [00:56:00] no, no, me, no, um, psychedelic medicines. Really just the shamanic rituals. Came back and, you know, was really not doing well. See, we said, you know something, let’s just like take a break from the chemo.

Uh, and she subsequently had a spontaneous regression of her disease, which almost never happens in ovarian cancer. It’s next to unheard of. Uh, and it went on for about two and a half years. It was incredible. She had belly full of tumor, high grade serous, uh, ovarian cancer, you know, platinum refractory, like the real thing.

And, uh, I had this two year regression, which was extraordinary. No chemo. Uh, ca 1 25 plummeted, scans, got better, belly, got better, got off all their pain meds. Um, shortly after this experience in the jungle. And so ultimately the disease started to grow. Half her tumors started to grow, half of them were shrunken, took her to the, or did a heroic 12 hour [00:57:00] surgery on her, cleaned her out.

The surgeon, uh, labeled the tumors as either shrunken away or growing. And the surgeon and I said, we gotta look at this. And we, we, we put together some, uh, a team of laboratory scientists who studied this extensively. And you know, when we see something called a mixed response where some tumors are growing, some are shrinking, uh, we generally presume that that’s because they’re resistant clones that appear in the body.

That’s sort of in the presumption in oncology. But what we found was that these tumors were genetically the same all over the body, whether they were shrinking or whether they were growing. The key difference between the growing tumors and the shrinking tumors is that the shrinking tumors, you could see infiltrating T cells, that’s an immune cell.

So they’re capable of killing cancers throughout the shrinking tumor, eating them up. Whereas in the growing tumor, you could see that they were excluded from the tumor. They were sort of on the outside of the tumor trying to get in. They couldn’t get in. And so clearly something [00:58:00] immunologic had been triggered, uh, in her, you know, shortly after she had this experience in South America.

And can I say for certain that that is, you know, what happened? No. The timing of it was really interesting. Um, and so, you know, who knows? This was, this was in Cell, which is like our, our leading, you know, it’s a big publication, but we didn’t mention anything about, about the Shaman. Um, but uh, you know, that certainly piqued my answer.

Like, what happened here? What happened? And I think we have to be open to asking these questions, right? We, we, we need to be. Um, I know that. I had a lifelong cat allergy and I, I inadvertently desensitized myself just by visiting a friend with a cat for two weeks. I didn’t have to. That’s the

Joe Moore: Andy Wheel story.

Dr Jason Konner: Yeah. I mean, there’s other things that happen with the immune system. There are ways to turn on and off. Our gut has a huge effect on this. Uh, [00:59:00] perhaps our, you know, glucocorticoid response that’s constantly triggered in this fear state, uh, is gonna be suppressing this. I mean, there’s so many, so many things.

Um, and, and is ayahuasca changing our body to making us. You know, more to allow the immune system to do its job. Maybe I, I mean, I think these are questions we need to be asking and investigating. Um, and, and, and I don’t know yet you

Joe Moore: think it’s possible to do this, like in, in the near term, like do you, do you think if you partnered with, I don’t know, Rutgers, just ’cause you’re in New Jersey, like, do you think this is something that could theoretically be executed on and, and you know, it, it’s, it’s a little cartoonish for me to think you could do this in a Yeah.

A single population with a single type of cancer, but it, yeah, I don’t really know how we would do that. You know,

Dr Jason Konner: it’s, it’s a little more nuanced than that because you don’t want turn the retreat setting into a, a clinical laboratory. Right. This is something, a very beautiful and personal experience

Joe Moore: mm-hmm.

Dr Jason Konner: That people [01:00:00] have. And, and I’m the last person who wants to interfere with that. And, and, and I. I, I remember I heard about some woman who had had ovarian cancer and treatment wasn’t working, and she went to the jungle and she, she experienced ayahuasca. And, and the story was that everything went away and that she ended up staying on and just stayed there for years and became a quote.

And I really wanted to talk with her. And, you know, I had a friend who went down and she said she doesn’t, she doesn’t like to talk about it. And you have to respect that, right? Like, I don’t know what her process was to achieve that, but if that’s something that she needs to hold onto for herself, um, you know, that’s her, you know, you have to respect that.

So, I, I think that we, we can’t be just looking at people as subjects, but at the same time, this is important information. So, so the, these issues really need to be brought to the fore. ’cause we can’t really look at this from the [01:01:00] usual scientific perspective, you know, it’s just not, not right. Mm-hmm. So I don’t know.

My hope is to somehow bear witness to this without interfering with this.

Joe Moore: Mm. I love that. Yeah. We’re, uh, kind of something we champion here is how do we just think a little bit broader about this, um, you know, scientific investigation topic. We can get really atomic and, and I don’t know, it’s kind of in this logical positive as frame, but once we have a few experiences, we think, oh, perhaps we can do science a little bit more skillfully, um, be a little bit more efficient with our scientific spend.

Um, and then hopefully bring it into clinic in a, you know, nice, great, safe way. Um, and powerful way. And yeah, it’s, it’s a tough one. We’ll, we’ll figure it out, but it’s definitely something that I think, uh, many of us are looking at. And I’m excited for you to be at Penn for this upcoming conference. So, um, I hope you find some allies and colleagues [01:02:00] there that want to talk about this.

Dr Jason Konner: I hope so too. I mean, really, I, I, I’m, I’m driven to help serve patients and, and families, as I was saying, and, and, and, and caregivers. Um, but I really think it, it’s critical that it starts with the, the healthcare system. And not only because healthcare workers really need this, it could really personally benefit from it, but ultimately it’s not going to reach patients.

Or not going to reach patients in a good way. Mm-hmm. Uh, if there’s not good psychedelic literacy, uh, in the healthcare community. So I, I ideally that there’s a lot more people with experiences, uh, who are talking about this, but at least hearing about it, knowing about it, uh, and having resources, I think, I think it’s gonna be critical.

Joe Moore: Yeah. So if you’re in, uh, I don’t know, y’all call it the tri-state area. If you’re in the tri-state area, go check out this conference at Penn. It’s coming up. It’s gonna be amazing. Um, it’s a very, um, I went last year. It was a lot bigger, but this looks like a really [01:03:00] stacked lineup. It should be really interesting.

And I love that. It’s, um, I just love the lineup. I love what they’re trying to do this year, so I wish I could be there. Have the best time, Jason. And, um, any, anything you want to like point people towards before we wrap here, where can people follow you online?

Dr Jason Konner: Sure. I mean, my venture, if you call it that, is still in its infancy.

Uh, I have a website I’m just putting together now, it’s called psychedelic oncology.com. Uh, I’m on Instagram, psychedelic oncology, and uh, hopefully we’ll start posting something soon. But, uh, reach out to me. You can, you can, uh, send me an email on the website and you know, if you wanna connect with me, just reach out.

My email is Dr. connor@psychedeliconcology.com. So, uh, I’m here to field questions.

Joe Moore: Outstanding. Well, thank you so much for your time and I hope we get to do it again in the future. And, and best of luck out there on your ventures.

Dr Jason Konner: I really enjoyed speaking with you, Joe. Thanks so much. Yeah, likewise. Thanks.