A clinical case that still unsettles
Before descending into the noise of the forums, it is worth examining the most solid material left by Abram Hoffer and Humphry Osmond, the two psychiatrists who, in the mid-20th century, championed the so-called “adrenochrome theory” of schizophrenia. Their work contains a detailed account of the reaction of an experienced colleague, identified only as “Dr. A. B.,” after receiving 10 mg of adrenochrome sublingually, plus an indeterminate amount orally. The report spans several pages; here, it suffices to focus on the essentials.
The response appeared about ten minutes after administration—a timeframe consistent with the sublingual route—and lasted until a gram of nicotinic acid seemingly returned him to normal. The important nuance is that “seemingly”: according to the authors, true recovery took much longer. The subject himself stated weeks later that he had not fully recovered until fifteen days had passed, while his wife placed his return to normalcy at several months.
What is striking about the clinical picture is where it hits. It is not the exuberant visual phenomenology we usually associate with classic psychedelics, but a dull and persistent alteration:
- Perception: Changes in afterimages, lighting, and distance calculation; objects that “pulsed,” and a distorted size-distance relationship. The authors insist there were no hallucinations, although the subject himself described on several occasions that “the trees seemed to explode suddenly before his eyes,” which fits better with a pseudo-hallucination or illusion than with intact perception.
- Thought: Irritability, impaired judgment, and, above all, a lack of awareness of his own state. So much so that A. B. concluded he had been given a placebo.
- Cognition: Inability to solve tests that would normally have been trivial for him.
- Mood: Hostile and abrasive to a point that his colleagues and friends described as unrecognizable.
From their book The Hallucinogens, it is worth rescuing two observations that the authors themselves emphasize. First: the experience induced by adrenochrome and its analog, adrenolutin, “is not like the typical LSD or mescaline experience”; changes occur first in thought and mood, with perception taking a backseat. Second is a warning that ages well: some effects could persist for several days and, in certain subjects, lead to “near-disastrous” outcomes. What made an apparently mild substance dangerous was not its intensity, but the lack of insight it generated: the user ceased to know they were intoxicated.
How science archived the matter
Here lies the rift. A psychiatrist describing such a marked clinical picture does not mean the compound is an established psychoactive. As Giorgio Samorini noted, the adrenochrome theory as a biochemical explanation for schizophrenia—and the megadose vitamin treatment Hoffer defended—was eventually refuted and discarded by academic psychiatry in later publications. And with that theory, the question of the compound’s possible psychoactive potential was also filed away.
The most forceful testimony against it comes from someone not suspected of closed-mindedness: Alexander Shulgin. In PIHKAL, he summarizes the episode almost as a historical curiosity. He recalls that there were reports suggesting aged, discolored adrenaline seemed to act on the central nervous system; that its oxidation products were identified as adrenochrome—intensely colored—and adrenolutin; and that the controversy “eventually faded away with time.” His conclusion leaves no room for doubt: it has never been accepted that the adrenochrome family is psychoactive, no one researches it, and today it is considered “an interesting footnote to history.”
The contradiction is disconcerting. On one hand, two clinicians describing intense and lasting reactions; on the other, the most influential chemist of modern psychedelia denying its psychoactivity. When the authorities themselves consider the matter closed, to whom do you turn? In the absence of active science, what remains is the other source: the anonymous experience of the forums.
The forums: between myth and anecdote
It is best to enter this space with your guard up. Most drug users consider adrenochrome a piece of drug-culture mythology—a substance more literary than real, indebted to the fantasy of Hunter S. Thompson—rather than something verifiable. Despite this, there is no shortage of people who swear they have tried it. In 2006, on one of the most active Spanish-language forums of the time, a user signing as Kaleidoscope recounted two experiences.
In his description, an acquaintance offered him a “grayish-black” substance on a toothpick, presented as a relative of LSD. An hour later, restlessness, intense dizziness, and vomiting appeared, followed by a state that, according to him, lasted nearly two days: back pain, physical exhaustion, nervousness “like after a few lines of cocaine,” and visuals described as entering a video game where everything looked like breathing modeling clay. The account mixes unverifiable claims—the biological origin of the material, the tiny amount—with a recognizable constant: a disagreeable and distressing experience, not exactly pleasant.
What followed is almost more revealing than the testimony. Another user, Aland Alejand—registered, curiously, on the same day—offered to meet up to test the material. After the meeting, he published an alarmed report: two days and two nights of “going crazy,” a “horrible” experience, family concern, and a sample sent to a laboratory. Days later, he claimed the analysis indicated “an oxidation or decomposition of adrenaline” with a slight chromium content, and concluded that it “is not for human consumption.” The promise to send samples to other forum members remained unfulfilled, and the conversation died out, as usually happens.
Critical reading
Let us treat these materials for what they are. The case of A. B. is an old clinical report, neither blind nor controlled, collected by researchers who championed a specific hypothesis: that expectation bias weighs on any interpretation. Forum testimonies have even fewer guarantees—uncertain identity, uncharacterized substance, unknown dose, no independent verification—and a “lab analysis” reported secondhand proves nothing. That two accounts coincide does not prove the effect: they may share suggestion, contamination from another substance, or pure narrative construction.
There is, however, one point where the two sources converge that deserves to be highlighted: neither describes a sought-after or pleasant experience. Where psychiatry points to a loss of insight and persistent effects, the forums speak of anguish, loss of control, and days of aftereffects. For harm reduction education, that coincidence is the only actionable takeaway: we are dealing with a poorly characterized material, with no known safety profile and surrounded by myth—exactly the scenario where curiosity comes at a high price. The honest conclusion is not to resolve the controversy, but to recognize that it remains open—and that the archive, not personal experimentation, is the appropriate place to visit it.
