Ibogaine provides therapeutic benefit for opioid use disorder and alcohol addiction in individuals who have failed other treatments.
"opiate use disorders in particular seem to be um highly benefited from Ibogaine when nothing else worked. HOST: And alcohol, too. GUEST1: And alcohol. Yeah." (said at 1:04:00)
While observational cohort studies and case series suggest that ibogaine can acutely reduce opioid withdrawal symptoms and decrease substance use in individuals with refractory opioid use disorder (who often had multiple prior treatment failures), evidence supporting its efficacy is limited to open-label, uncontrolled studies with high risk of bias. There are currently no completed randomized controlled trials establishing its efficacy or safety for opioid use disorder or alcohol use disorder. Furthermore, clinical evidence for alcohol use disorder is largely restricted to preclinical animal models and small naturalistic cohorts, and ibogaine carries serious safety risks, particularly cardiotoxicity (QTc prolongation and fatal arrhythmias).
- supports: Treatment of opioid use disorder with ibogaine: detoxification and drug use outcomes. (The American journal of drug and alcohol abuse 2018)
"Ibogaine was associated with substantive effects on opioid withdrawal symptoms and drug use in subjects for whom other treatments had been unsuccessful, and may provide a useful prototype for discovery and development of innovative pharmacotherapy of addiction." (abstract, conclusions, passage verified)
pubmedfull study (doi) - context: The therapeutic effects of psychedelics for opioid use disorder: A systematic review of cl… (Psychiatry research 2025)
"Findings indicate few studies completed using serotonergic psychedelics, with most investigating ibogaine or ketamine. In addition, findings are limited by many studies of weak design focused on opioid withdrawal, and few double-blind or placebo-controlled trials with considerable methodological heterogeneity making comparisons difficult across compounds. Most studies were found to have a high risk of bias mostly related to lack of randomization, blinding, and blinding of assessment outcomes." (abstract, results, passage verified)
pubmedfull study (doi) - context: Ibogaine: Therapeutic Potential, Cardiac Safety, and Translational Perspectives in the Tre… (Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) 2026)
"However, the clinical translation of ibogaine remains substantially constrained by fragmented and heterogeneous evidence, the absence of regulatory frameworks in several jurisdictions, limited phytochemical validation and standardization of available formulations, and unresolved concerns regarding cardiac safety." (abstract, passage verified)
pubmedfull study (doi)