Category Archives: legal cannabis

August 28, 2022 · 11:16 pm

New study shows patient preference for medical cannabis products in the absence of clinical guidelines

Due to a lack of publicly available data, understanding what products medical cannabis patients use for various conditions has mostly come from survey responses. In a new study, USC Schaeffer Center researchers established a clearer picture by analyzing point-of-sale data from nearly 17,000 patients who made more than 80,000 purchases as part of the New York state medical cannabis program.

The researchers found considerable variation in the products chosen for most medical conditions, and high variability in labeled doses of THC.

“While the medical cannabis market is not new, there is still relatively little research on patient purchasing behavior,” says Alexandra Kritikos, a postdoctoral research fellow in the USC Schaeffer Center and the USC Institute for Addiction Science. “Unfortunately, our analysis suggests that patients may not be getting consistent guidance from clinicians and pharmacists and, in many disease areas, there seems to be a lack of clear clinical data on appropriate dosing.”

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Therapy possible to treat detrimental effects of marijuana

At the risk of being called cannabis-crazy, I thought this item on possible negative effects of marijuana to be worthwhile.

Summary: Prenatal exposure to THC makes dopamine neurons hyperactive and increases the sensitivity to the behavioral effects of the compound during pre-adolescence. This may increase the risk of developing schizophrenia later in life. However, treatment with pregnenolone, a drug under clinical trials for ASD, cannabis use disorder, and schizophrenia, appears to correct the brain abnormalities and behavioral problems associated with prenatal cannabis exposure. Source: University of Maryland School of Medicine

The researchers were able to correct these behavioral problems and brain abnormalities by treating experimental animals with pregnenolone, an FDA-approved drug currently under investigation in clinical trials for cannabis use disorder, schizophrenia, autism, and bipolar disorder. The image is in the public domain.

As a growing number of U.S. states legalize the medicinal and recreational use of marijuana, an increasing number of American women are using cannabis before becoming pregnant and during early pregnancy often to treat morning sickness, anxiety, and lower back pain. Although emerging evidence indicates that this may have long-term consequences for their babies’ brain development, how this occurs remains unclear. Continue reading →

How about standardizing units for cannabis to improve mental health – Study

I smoked weed around 50 years ago when I had a lot of jazz musician friends. I would also guess that there is little comparison between the marijuana that is available today with what we had back then.

Introducing and prescribing standard units for cannabis, which make people aware of the concentrations of THC in the product, could help improve mental health treatments and outcomes. Source: University of Bath

Despite widespread use of the drug around the world and increasing moves to legalize its sale for recreational consumption, standard units – which have been commonplace for alcohol for many years – have never been adopted in health guidelines for cannabis.

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The authors show that in countries where cannabis is legally sold, such as Canada, the number of standard units a product contains could be easily added to existing labels on product packaging. The image is in the public domain.

The researchers, from the Addiction and Mental Health Group at the University of Bath with collaborators from King’s College London, UCL and the Australian Catholic University in Melbourne, suggest that more needs to be done to make users aware of the dose of ‘THC’ – the drug’s main psychoactive component. Continue reading →