Competencies and Ethical Governance for Psychedelic‑Assisted Therapies: A Practice‑Embedded Quality‑Improvement Framework
Shannon Dames, Keith Williams, Allan Campbell, Wes Taylor, Marti Harder, Michelle Gagnon, Geraldine Manson, Pamela KryskowABSTRACT
Rationale
Psychedelic‑assisted therapy (PaT) is a rapidly expanding practice area that spans multiple disciplines and regulated and unregulated settings, without shared ownership by any single profession. As a result, training and service delivery are advancing more rapidly than the development and evaluation of research‑informed governance frameworks from public and academic bodies. Consequently, practitioners may rely on guidance that varies in transparency, evidence base and methodological rigour, leading to inconsistent safety and ethical expectations.
Aims
In response to this gap, we describe a competency framework developed over a 4‑year, practice‑embedded quality improvement (QI) process focused on governance, safety and accountability.
Methods
Within a post‐graduate PaT programme at a Canadian university, we used an iterative QI approach that integrated evidence‑informed literature with recurring feedback from learners, faculty, supervised practice partners and cultural knowledge‑keeper guidance. This process is centred on developmental learning, cultural responsiveness and safeguards appropriate to non‑ordinary states of consciousness.
Results
The framework centres on both doing (technical and clinical aspects of practice) and being (relational presence and ethical stance). These dimensions are supported by a programme‑level Code of Ethics addressing safeguards related to safety, confidentiality and privacy, transparency, equity and cultural accountability, competence, environmental stewardship and power and boundary management, including touch and sexual boundaries. The framework operationalizes five competency domains: (1) therapeutic presence and trustworthiness; (2) culture and identity; (3) historical, political, and regulatory literacy; (4) evidence‑informed clinical knowledge; and (5) a trauma‑ and equity‑informed therapeutic process spanning screening, preparation, informed consent, team roles and integration.
Conclusion
Rather than a fixed consensus standard or externally validated competency model, this framework offers a practice‐embedded, QI‐derived design logic that can be locally adapted across diverse contexts. Its contribution is governance‐oriented: clarifying ethical guardrails, developmental competencies and revision processes for future implementation and evaluation.