Cannabis
10 Sep Does CBD Function as a Sleep Aid?
You should always see a doctor first if you have poor sleep quality, have trouble falling asleep, or staying asleep before you start self-medicating with CBD....
07 Sep Study Finds Little Evidence Recreational Marijuana Laws Encourage Youth Marijuana
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_58049" align="alignleft" width="160"] Dr. Anderson[/caption]
Mark Anderson, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Agricultural Economics and Economics
Montana State University, IZA, and NBER
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: In a previous study that was published in JAMA Pediatrics, we used Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) data and found that the adoption of recreational marijuana laws (RMLs) was associated with an 8% decrease in the odds of marijuana use among high school students. This earlier study, however, had pre-legalization and post-legalization data from only 7 states and pre- and post-recreational sales data from only 3 states, calling into question the generalizability of our findings.
28 May Autism Spectrum Disorder: Incidence of Diagnosis in Japan One of Highest in World
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Daimei Sasayama, M.D., Ph.D. Department of Psychiatry Shinshu University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is increasing worldwide. A 2016 US survey reported a prevalence of 1.85% in 8-year-olds, and a birth cohort study in Denmark reported that the future cumulative incidence of ASD could exceed 2.8%. Our recent regional cohort study in Japan reported an even higher cumulative incidence of 3.1%. So we examined whether the cumulative incidence in our regional cohort represents the nationwide incidence in Japan.
09 Apr Medical Marijuana as Therapeutic Option for Intractable Itch
Future randomized controlled studies are needed to determine dosing, efficacy, and safety of medical marijuana for the treatment of various forms of itch....
06 Apr Fatal Car Collisions After Marijuana Legalized
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_57068" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Sarah Windle[/caption]
Sarah Windle, MPH
PhD Student in Epidemiology
Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Occupational Health
McGill University (Montréal, Québec, Canada)
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Concerns have been raised about the potential for increases in impaired driving following the legalization of recreational cannabis use in Canada in October 2018. Data from Statistics Canada suggest that cannabis use in the previous three months increased among adults (15 and older) from 14% before legalization in 2018 to 17% in 2019. Among those users with a driver’s license, 13% reported driving within two hours of cannabis use. While this proportion remained the same before and after legalization, this indicates that the absolute number of individuals who reported driving within two hours of use has increased following legalization (due to an increase in the number of users).
08 Mar THC Concentrated and Long Lasting in Breast Milk
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_56867" align="alignleft" width="161"] Dr. Wymore[/caption]
Erica M. Wymore, MD MPH
Assistant Professor, Neonatal- Perinatal Medicine
Department of Pediatrics, Section of Neonatology
University of Colorado School of Medicine
Children's Hospital Colorado
[caption id="attachment_56868" align="alignleft" width="161"]
Dr. Bunik[/caption]
Maya Bunik, MD, MPH | Professor, Pediatrics
Medical Director, Child Health Clinic, Primary Care | Breastfeeding Management Clinic
Adult and Child Consortium for Health Outcomes Research and Delivery Science (ACCORDS)
School of Medicine| University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Children's Hospital Colorado
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Marijuana legalization has been increasing in the United States, with increasing consumption of marijuana products. Currently, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine (ABM) do not recommend marijuana use during pregnancy or lactation due to concerning though limited data on the effects of perinatal marijuana exposure.
As there has been increasing prevalence of women using marijuana during pregnancy due to legalization and perceptions of safety, we sought to determine the duration of THC excretion in breast milk among women who had evidence of marijuana use at delivery and abstained post-partum.
10 Feb Medical Cannabis Effect on Blood Pressure and Hypertension
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ran Abuhasira MD, PhD student Cannabis Clinical Research Institute and Clinical Research Center Soroka University Medical Center, and Faculty of Health Sciences Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Beer Sheva, Israel MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The background for the study is the steady rise of cannabis use as a therapeutic in Israel and in many countries around the world. This largest increasing population of patients treated with medical cannabis is the older adults. However, very little data was published about cannabis treatment in older adults, and specifically about the cardiovascular and metabolic implications. T
he main finding of the study is that cannabis treatment for 3 months was associated with a reduction in both systolic and diastolic blood pressure values, as measured by consequent 24-hours ABPM tests. In addition, no significant changes were found in blood lipids profile, hemoglobin A1C, fasting insulin, C-reactive protein, kidney function tests, electrolytes, anthropometric measurements, and ECG parameters.
03 Feb Entrepreneurs on Pot Developed Creative But Impossible Business Ideas
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_56551" align="alignleft" width="142"]
Dr. Warnick[/caption]
Benjamin J. Warnick, PhD
Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship
Carson College of Business
Washington State University Vancouver
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Popular culture has perpetuated a notion that cannabis users are more creative. Along these lines, some successful CEOs and entrepreneurs—like Steve Jobs, for example—have claimed that cannabis use has benefitted their creativity at work.
Despite such claims and increased legalization and use of cannabis, the implications of cannabis use for entrepreneurs’ creativity has yet to be rigorously tested. My coauthors and I were very intrigued to dive into the implications of cannabis use for entrepreneurs, whether good or bad. This seemed all the more relevant given the increasing legalization, destigmatization, and use of cannabis.
29 Jan Prevalence of Cannabis Dispensaries Linked to Reduced Opioids Deaths
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_56512" align="alignleft" width="130"]
Dr. Kovács[/caption]
Balázs Kovács PhD
Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior
Yale School of Management
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Our study looks at the association between the prevalence of legal cannabis stores, called “dispensaries”, and opioid-related mortality rates in the U.S. We find that higher cannabis dispensary counts are associated with reduced opioid-related mortality rates. We find this relationship holds for both medical dispensaries, which only serve patients who have a state-approved medical card or doctor’s recommendation, as well as for recreational dispensaries, which sell to adults 21 years and older. The statistical associations we find appears most pronounced with the class of opioids that includes fentanyl and its analogs.
15 Jan More Cannabis Outlets, More Cannabis Use By Young Adults
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_56418" align="alignleft" width="130"]
Dr. Pedersen[/caption]
Eric R. Pedersen, Ph.D.
Adjunct Behavioral Scientist, RAND
Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Keck School of Medicine
University of Southern California
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: In November of 2016, CA voted to legalize cannabis for sale and possession to adults 21 and older for recreational use. It wasn’t until January of 2018 that stores in most parts of LA County (we call these “outlets”) were legally able to begin selling recreational cannabis. We were collecting data from about 2,500 young adults in LA County as part of a longitudinal study (Principal Investigator Elizabeth D’Amico at RAND) and were able to look at cannabis use and intentions assessed at a period prior to the opening of the recreational cannabis outlets (pre-January 2018) to a period when those outlets were open (after January 2018). It has been suggested that once cannabis was more available for recreational purchase (and not just for medical purposes among those enrolled in CA’s medical marijuana program), use of cannabis among young adults would increase.
24 Dec Teen Driving After Using Marijuana
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_56327" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Dr. Li[/caption]
Li Li, MS, PhD Candidate
Division of Epidemiology, College of Public Health, Ohio State University
Graduate Research Associate, Center for Injury Research and Policy
The Abigail Wexner Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Marijuana use impairs cognitive abilities necessary for safe driving, including reaction time, road lane-tracking ability, and attention maintenance. Given increasing legalization of marijuana use in the US, our study aimed to estimate marijuana-impaired driving among teens at a national level and help to identify the current prevalence to guide future intervention programs.
09 Nov Ophthalmology: Identifying Racial and Socioeconomic Disparities in Eye Health
Posted at 20:00h
in Author Interviews, Cannabis, Ophthalmology, Race/Ethnic Diversity, Social Issues
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
[caption id="attachment_55891" align="alignleft" width="200"] Dr. Uhr[/caption]
Joshua Uhr MD
Ophthalmologist
Philadelphia, PA
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Disparities in American society have been at the forefront of the public consciousness in recent months. As part of the larger discussion about inequality, disparities in health outcomes have received much attention. In light of the renewed recognition that these disparities are stark and widespread, we felt it important to evaluate disparities in our own field, ophthalmology.
Previous studies have shown disparate outcomes for individual eye conditions, such as glaucoma, cataract, and retinal detachment. Although the common and relevant endpoint of these is visual impairment, few prior studies have examined disparities in visual impairment more broadly. Our aim was to provide an updated analysis of disparity in visual impairment among adults in the United States based on race and socioeconomic status.
04 Nov What Research Tells Us About CBD Effectiveness And Safety
While CBD has a powerful effect on seizures, neuropathy, and even behavioral disorders, it is not a cure-all as some manufacturers may claim....
21 Oct CBG vs CBD: What Are the Differences?
Posted at 19:54h
in Cannabis
While CBD and CBG are both cannabinoids by nature, they do come from different parts of the cannabis plant, which means they serve different purposes and have different properties....
21 Oct Short-Term Reduction in OCD Symptoms with Cannabis
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_55699" align="alignleft" width="199"] Dr. Cuttler[/caption]
Carrie Cuttler, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Washington State University
Department of Psychology
Pullman, WA, 99164-4820
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: While many studies have examined the acute effects of cannabis on other mental health symptoms such as anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and psychosis there is almost no research on acute effects of cannabis on symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in humans. Nevertheless, we have previously found that acute cannabis intoxication is associated with reductions in anxiety as well as with reductions in the intrusive thoughts characteristic of PTSD. Further previous research using a rodent model of compulsive behavior has provided pre-clinical evidence that cannabidiol (CBD) - which is the second most common constituent in the cannabis plant - reduces compulsive behavior.
09 Oct Many Older Adults Using Cannabis For First Time
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_55623" align="alignleft" width="150"] Dr. Kaufmann[/caption]
Christopher Kaufmann, PhD
Co-first author of the study and assistant professor
Division of Geriatrics and Gerontology in the Department of Medicine
UC San Diego
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: We examined cannabis use by older patients seen in our geriatrics clinic at the University of California San Diego. We surveyed patients who came to our clinic for routine care, and found that 15% of those surveyed had used cannabis within the past 3 years. Half of users reported using cannabis regularly and most used for medical purposes. The most common targeted conditions were pain, problems sleeping, and anxiety, and patients found cannabis to be helpful in treating these conditions. We also found that 61% had initiated cannabis use after age 60, and these new users engaged in less risky consumption practices than current users who also used earlier in life.
07 Oct Adolescents and Young Adults Will Frequently Vape Both Nicotine and Cannabis
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_55574" align="alignleft" width="180"]
Dr. Lanza[/caption]
Isabella Lanza, PhD
Associate Professor of Human Development
California State University, Long Beach
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: This is the first study to examine both nicotine vaping and cannabis vaping trajectories across adolescence and young adulthood, which allowed us to assess whether poly-substance vaping is common among adolescents and young adults. Poly-substance vaping (nicotine and cannabis vaping) was reported among a significant proportion of participants in the study (25% were identified as poly-substance vapers). For those that either escalated to frequent nicotine vaping use in adolescence or initiated frequent nicotine vaping use in young adulthood, the probability of engaging in cannabis vaping was very high (85%+).
02 Oct CDC Study Finds Association Between Marijuana Use and Risky Behaviors in High School Students
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Heather Breeze Clayton, PhD, MPH Senior Scientist, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control CDC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Thirty-three states and the District of Columbia now have policies in place legalizing marijuana for medical or adult use. While the health effects of marijuana use continue to be studied, substantial evidence suggests that a number of health risks – including cognitive and mental health outcomes- are made worse by earlier initiation of marijuana, and heavier use patterns. Scientific knowledge about the association between marijuana use and other health and risk-taking behavior in youth is still evolving. Accordingly, we sought to use nationally representative data from the Youth Risk Behavior Survey to assess what the relationship is between different patterns of marijuana use in youth (more established use vs. non-established use patterns) and a number of risk-taking and violence related behaviors.
25 Sep ABCD Study: Risks to Children From Cannabis During Pregnancy
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sarah E. Paul, BA , Graduate Student and Ryan Bogdan, PhD, Associate Professor BRAIN Lab Washington University in St. Louis St. Louis, MO 63130 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Sarah Paul: This study was motivated by several trends in cannabis use, its legal landscape, and people's perception of risk. As more states legalize recreational cannabis use, cannabis has become more accessible as well as more potent. Over the past couple of decades, the percentage of adolescents and adults who think that cannabis use is risky or harmful has fallen substantially. Cannabis dispensaries have been reported to actually recommend cannabis to pregnant women for the treatment of pregnancy-related nausea. And finally, between 2002/2003 and 2016/2017, the percentage of women reporting cannabis use during their pregnancies rose 106%. Given these trends and the mixed literature regarding the potential consequences associated with prenatal cannabis exposure, we aimed to comprehensively examine a range of outcomes in a large, representative sample while accounting for a host of important potentially confounding covariates.
04 Sep Sibling Study Reveals Impact of Heavy Cannnabis Use on Memory
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_55310" align="alignleft" width="168"]
Dr. Ellingson[/caption]
Jarrod Ellingson PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of Psychiatry
Anschutz Medical Campus
University of Colorado Denver
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: We know that cannabis use is associated with many negative outcomes, but there could be many of reasons for that. For example, socioeconomic factors and peer influences both affect adolescent cannabis use and poorer cognitive functioning. To account for some of those risk factors, we studied nearly 600 sibling pairs with moderate to heavy cannabis use. We found that, as a person uses more cannabis than their sibling, they tend to have worse memory recall than their sibling.
23 Jun Increase in Traffic Fatalities Linked to Cannabis Laws Vary by State
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Julian Santaella Tenorio, MSc DrPH Epidemiology Center for Opioid Epidemiology and Policy Division of Epidemiology, Department of Population Health New York University Langone School of Medicine, New York, New York MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings?Response: This study found that recreational cannabis laws were associated with increases in traffic fatalities in Colorado (mean of 75 excess fatalities per year) but not in Washington State. These findings suggest that unintended effects of recreational cannabis laws can be heterogeneous and may be specific to variations in how these laws are implemented
(eg, density of recreational cannabis stores).
22 Jun Implementation of Recreational Marijuana and Decreased Prescription Opioid Use
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_54659" align="alignleft" width="200"] Amalie K. Kropp Lopez[/caption]
Amalie K. Kropp Lopez, MS
MD Candidate
Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine Class of 2023
Scranton, Pennsylvania
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: The opioid crisis is still affecting America, effecting millions of people from all walks of life. With the high risks of abuse and overtreatment with opioids, marijuana has been a newly reconsidered alterative for pain treatment. This study sought to quantify the changes in prescription opioid distribution using data reported by the Drug Enforcement Administration in Colorado after the legalization of recreational marijuana which gave the public increased access to its pain-relieving effects.
22 Jun What Happens to Traffic Deaths When Marijuana is Legalized?
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Russell Kamer, MD Department of Medicine, New York Medical College, Valhalla 15 North Broadway, Suite E White Plains, NY 10601 New York MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: It is well known that marijuana usage impairs driving ability, yet the early studies of the effects of recreational marijuana legalization on traffic fatalities were inconclusive.
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings?
Response: By analyzing data over a longer time period, we found that the legalization of recreational marijuana increased traffic deaths in the first four states to legalize. Traffic fatalities increased about 20% in those states. If we apply these numbers to the nation as a whole, nationwide legalization would be associated with about 7,000 excess traffic fatalities each year.
20 Jun Medicinal Cannabis Users Report Better Quality of Life and Fewer Emergency Room Visits
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_54623" align="alignleft" width="80"]
Dr. Vandrey[/caption]
Ryan Vandrey, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Behavioral Pharmacology Research Unit
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Baltimore, MD 21224
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: The background for this study is that 33 states in the U.S. have legalized medicinal cannabis use and millions of people are using cannabis for therapeutic purposes, but we have very little data on the broad health impacts of medicinal cannabis use.
We surveyed medicinal cannabis users and non-using controls who had a variety of health problems and found that the cannabis users reported better health, quality of life, and less healthcare utilization compared with controls. Because we worried about group characteristics accounting for the differences observed, we then did an analysis of people who switched groups over time (e.g. non-users who later initiated cannabis use or cannabis users who later quit) and found the same differences emerged in the same individuals over time. Important to note here is that not all individuals who used cannabis benefited from it and that most participants were using high CBD varieties of cannabis in conjunction with more traditional treatments.
21 May Cannabis Cravings Differ Between Men and Women
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_54310" align="alignleft" width="160"]
Dr. Filbey[/caption]
Francesca Filbey, PhD
Associate Provost and Professor of Cognition and Neuroscience
Bert Moore Chair
The University of Texas at Dallas
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Studies have reported differences in how males and females respond to cannabis and how they develop problems related to cannabis use. We sought to determine whether craving may underlie this difference in male and female cannabis users.
18 May EVALI: Adolescents More Likely to Obtain Vaping Products Through Informal Sources
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Susan Hocevar Adkins, MD Lead Author, Senior Medical Officer, and Commander United States Public Health Service CDC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Since August 2019, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and state, local, and territorial health departments have been investigating a national outbreak of e-cigarette, or vaping, product use-associated lung injury (EVALI). Although clinical presentation and outcomes of EVALI patients generally have been reported, data on adolescent patients are more limited. This article fills this gap by using data from national EVALI surveillance at CDC to examine demographic, substance use, and clinical characteristics of adolescent EVALI patients relative to young adult and adult EVALI patients.
22 Apr Fewer EVALI Cases in States with Recreational Marijuana
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_53964" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Dr. Hollingsworth[/caption]
Alex Hollingsworth PhD
Assistant Professor
O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs
Indiana University
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: I've been working with Coady Wing and Ashley Bradford on a few different studies of the effects of recreational marijuana laws on drug and alcohol use.
Soon after EVALI became a major issue, the prevailing theory from the CDC and others was that EVALI was caused by the use of vitamin E acetate in illegal THC vaping products.
Our group read about this and we thought about some of the things that often happen in black markets for illegal drugs. For instance, during the alcohol prohibition era, bootleg alcohol producers often made and sold alcohol products that were not that safe to drink. In more recent years, there are cases where black market sellers of illegal drugs like heroin try to increase profit margins by adding other substances, which can be harmful.
We thought that maybe something like that could be happening in EVALI. Perhaps people in states where recreational marijuana is legal tended to purchase marijuana products from the legal market and the legal market was not selling any marijuana vaping products that included vitamin E acetate.
10 Apr How Common is Cannabis Withdrawal Syndrome?
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_53839" align="alignleft" width="137"] Dr. Bahji[/caption]
Anees Bahji, MD
PGY5, Department of Psychiatry, Queen’s University
M.Sc. Candidate, Department of Public Health Sciences,
Queen’s University
Kingston, ON, Canada
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
- There has been much speculation into the existence of a withdrawal syndrome involving cannabis much like withdrawal syndromes from opioids or alcohol. Our goal for this study was to estimate the prevalence of cannabis withdrawal syndrome (CWS) and to identify any risk factors for CWS.
- There has been a lot of research into cannabis withdrawal syndrome (CWS) in the past. A big part of this review involved understanding where the CWS field is in terms of the shared understanding on its epidemiology and physiology.
- To that end, we were not surprised to find that the prevalence of cannabis withdrawal syndrome was high. However, we found that some of the characteristics of CWS are consistent with other substance use disorders, which really serves to legitimize the decision to classify CWS and cannabis use disorders as psychiatric conditions.
25 Mar Animal Study Finds Vaporized Cannabis Can Enhance Drug Seeking Behavior
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:Ryan J. McLaughlin, PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of Integrative Physiology & Neuroscience
College of Veterinary Medicine
Washington State University, Pullman, WA
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: The evolving legal landscape concerning the use of cannabis has increased urgency to better understand its effects on the brain and behavior. Animal models are advantageous in this respect; however, researchers traditionally use forced injections of synthetic cannabinoids which fails to capture the complex effects of volitional cannabis consumption.
In our study, we developed a novel model of cannabis self-administration using response-contingent delivery of vaporized cannabis extracts containing high concentrations of Δ9 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) or cannabidiol (CBD).