Cumulative Dosing

Pangea was founded in 2006 in Tijuana, Mexico, a colorful and turbulent city that shares its border with Southern California. Clare Wilkins took over management of the clinic, originally named the Ibogaine Association, approximately 8 months after her treatment for methadone addiction in 2005.

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The treatment model that we inherited was similar to that still used today by many ibogaine providers around the world. Clients arrived on a Monday for a 5-day treatment, and underwent further blood work, a medical evaluation and new ecg, and a clinical history. That very evening they were administered a test dose, followed by a large, single dose of ibogaine hydrochloride. 

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Multiple doctors were present throughout the night and each day afterward and clients were attached to monitors that would set off alarms when oxygen levels or pulse fluctuated beyond certain parameters. Even with all of these precautions and medical supervision, we experienced emergencies on a regular basis due to unknown factors, but primarily due to the potency and potential for challenging or even traumatic experiences with initial high dosage of ibogaine hydrochloride, especially with already physically and psychologically compromised clientele.

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We built upon the model that we inherited, from the very best information that we could access to improve the safety and efficacy of treatments; a living commitment we maintain to this day: to precisely address the evermore complex and novel chemicals and behavioural maladaptations humans are using to survive.

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Of course, during this time, many clients experienced intense epiphanies, some with visions that clearly explained the roots of their addiction, in a multiplicity of manners. Occasionally these included portentous visions of their own demise if they continued on the same path of self harm.

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Yet amidst our successes, we gradually came to find that this model needed modification. In a 5 day period we could not begin to address the myriad of factors, including chronic malnutrition, which underlie the states of disease and addiction we were seeing. These are marked by neurological patterns and habits shaped over a lifetime by cognitive biases, poor diet, enculturation, trauma, and undiagnosed brain injuries, not to mention disenfranchisement and enmeshment with utterly broken social systems and the sense of failure dwelling within so many for not having reached self-mastery in a rigged game. 

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Neural pathways are embedded. It requires vigilant daily awareness and practice to override the default modes of decision-making, and nutritional support to assist in the enduring task of lifestyle remodeling. We continually found that we needed more time to give clients access to other therapeutic modalities available to integrate their processes and that we needed to be in a natural setting.

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Today, our programs are dramatically different in many ways. When clients first arrive they are stabilized for several days, during which we initiate a cleansing diet and continue with a personalized nutritional protocol. Iboga is introduced slowly and concurrently with psychotherapy and somatic therapy, allowing for much deeper and more fruitful self-reflection and awareness practice to occur. Over the course of days and weeks, iboga cultivates a mind state conducive to powerful realizations about one’s agency and responsibility, as well as the ability to more clearly identify life’s obstacles, their purposes and value and how to regulate one's relationship to the world and self. ​

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Our journey began as a high-turnover clinic operating out of a city that experienced high tensions because of immigration and drug war violence. We averaged about three clients per week, and had a high staff to client ratio. However, although most of our doctors were formally trained they were naïve to the experiential aspects of ibogaine and addiction.

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Where we would have previously offered 80 to 100 treatments in a year, we now offer closer to 10. This has allowed for our small team to provide detailed, bespoke treatments, and our experience has been immensely rewarding, educational and more manageable, as we explore nascent therapies and continually evolve. 

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