Hepatitis C is a viral disease of the liver that afflicts an estimated four million in the United States alone. Chronic hepatitis C is typically associated with depression, fatigue, joint pain and liver impairment, including cirrhosis and liver cancer. Patients diagnosed with the disease frequently report using cannabis for treating both symptoms of the disease and the nausea associated with antiviral therapy.

An observational study by investigators at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) revealed that patients afflicted with hepatitis C who used cannabis were significantly more likely to adhere to their treatment regimen than patients who did not use it. However, no clinical trials assessing cannabinoid use for this indication are available in the scientific literature.

It is indicated by preclinical data that endocannabinoid system could moderate aspects of chronic liver disease and inflammation could be reduced by cannabinoids in experimental models of hepatitis. Nevertheless, other clinical reviews have reported a positive association between cannabis use on a daily basis and the progression of liver fibrosis (excessive tissue build up) and steatosis (excessive fat build up) in select hepatitis C patients.

Investigators from Canada and Germany, writing in the October 2006 issue of the European Journal of Gastroenterology, concluded that cannabis’ “potential benefits of a higher likelihood of treatment success [for hepatitis c patients] appear to outweigh [its] risks.”

References:

[1] Schnelle et al. 1999. Results of a standardized survey on the medical use of cannabis products in the German-speaking area. Forschende Komplementarmedizin (Germany) 3: 28-36.
[2] David Berstein. 2004. “Hepatitis C – Current state of the art and future directions.” MedScape Today.
[3] Sylvestre et al. 2006. Cannabis use improves retention and virological outcomes in patients treated for hepatitis C. European Journal of Gastroenterology & Hepatology. 18: 1057-1063.
[4] Zamora-Valdes et al. 2005. The endocannabinoid system in chronic liver disease (PDF). Annals of Hepatology 4: 248-254.
[5] Gabbey et al. 2005. Endocannabinoids and liver disease – review. Liver International 25: 921-926.
[6] Lavon et al. 2003. A novel synthetic cannabinoid derivative inhibits inflammatory liver damage via negative cytokine regulation. Molecular Pharmacology 64: 1334-1344.
[7] Hezode et al. 2005. Daily cannabis smoking as a risk factor for progression of fibrosis in chronic hepatitis C. Hepatology 42: 63-71.
[8] Ishida et al. 2008. Influence of cannabis use on severity of hepatitis C disease. Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology 6: 69-75.
[9] Parfieniuk and Flisiak. 2008. Role of cannabinoids in liver disease. World Journal of Gastroenterology 14: 6109-6114.
[10] Fischer et al. 2006. Treatment for hepatitis C virus and cannabis use in illicit drug user patients: implications and questions. European Journal of Gastroenterology & Hepatology. 18: 1039-1042.
[11] Schwabe and Siegmund. 2005. op. cit.
[12] Hezode et al. 2005. op. cit.
[13] David Berstein. 2004. op. cit.
[14] Hezode et al. 2008. Daily cannabis use: a novel risk factor of steatosis severity in patients with chronic hepatitis C. Gastroenterology 134: 432-439.
[15] Purohit et al. 2010. Role of cannabinoids in the development of fatty liver (steatosis). The AAPS Journal 12: 233-237.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) or Lou Gehrig’s disease is a fatal neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by the selective loss of motor neurons in the brain stem, spinal cord, and motor cortex. It is estimated that around 30,000 Americans are living with the complication that often arises spontaneously and afflicts otherwise healthy adults. More than half of the affected patients die within 2.5 years following the onset of symptoms.

An absence of clinical trials investigating the use of cannabinoids for ALS treatment was revealed by a review of the scientific literature. However, it is indicated by recent preclinical findings that cannabinoids may delay progression of the disease, lending support to anecdotal reports by patients that cannabinoids may be efficacious in moderating the disease’s development and in alleviating certain ALS-related symptoms like depression, drooling, appetite loss, and pain.

Investigators at the California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, writing in the March 2004 issue of the journal Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis & Other Motor Neuron Disorders, reported that the administration of THC both before and after the onset of ALS symptoms staved disease progression and prolonged survival in animals compared to untreated controls.

The administration of other naturally occurring and synthetic cannabinoids may also moderate disease progression but not necessarily impact survival, according to additional trials in animal models of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. A recent study has demonstrated that blocking the CB1 cannabinoid receptor did extend life span in an ALS mouse model, indicating that the beneficial effects of cannabinoids on ALS could be mediated by non-CB1 receptor mechanisms.

A team of investigators writing in the American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Medicine in 2010 reported, “Based on the currently available scientific data, it is reasonable to think that cannabis might significantly slow the progression of ALS, potentially extending life expectancy and substantially reducing the overall burden of the disease.” They concluded, “There is an overwhelming amount of preclinical and clinical evidence to warrant initiating a multicenter randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of cannabis as a disease-modifying compound in ALS.”

References:

[1] Amtmann et al. 2004. Survey of cannabis use in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. The American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care 21: 95-104.
[2] Raman et al. 2004. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: delayed disease progression in mice by treatment with a cannabinoid. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis & Other Motor Neuron Disorders 5: 33-39.
[3] Weydt et al. 2005. Cannabinol delays symptom onset in SOD1 transgenic mice without affecting survival. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis & Other Motor Neuron Disorders 6: 182-184.
[4] Bilsland et al. 2006. Increasing cannabinoid levels by pharmacological and genetic manipulation delay disease progression in SOD1 mice. The FASEB Journal 20: 1003-1005.
[5] Ibid.
[6]Carter et al. 2010. Cannabis and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: hypothetical and practical applications, and a call for clinical trials. American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Medicine 27: 347-356.

Scientists of the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research (CMCR) of the University of California in San Diego, USA, have investigated among others the effects of cannabis on appetite hormones in the course of a placebo-controlled trial with HIV patients, who suffered from pain.

Twenty-eight patients had been included to investigate the effects of smoked cannabis on their pain in the original already published clinical study. Seven of these patients selected for investigating the blood levels of the hormones leptin, ghrelin, peptide YY, and insulin after exposition with cannabis and placebo in a cross-over design.

Cannabis administration, compared to placebo, was associated with significant increases in plasma levels of ghrelin and leptin, and decreases in peptide YY. It however did not significantly influence insulin levels. Authors stated that “cannabis-related changes in these hormones had a magnitude similar to what has been observed with food intake over the course of a day in normal volunteers, suggesting physiological relevance. “They concluded that “these findings are consistent with modulation of appetite hormones mediated through endogenous cannabinoid receptors, independent of glucose metabolism.”

Reference:

Riggs PK, Vaida F, Rossi SS, Sorkin LS, Gouaux B, Grant I, Ellis RJ. A pilot study of the effects of cannabis on appetite hormones in HIV-infected adult men. Brain Res. 2011 Nov 7. [in press])

Urinary incontinence, defined as a loss of bladder control, may result from many biological factors, including weak bladder muscles and inflammation, as well as from nerve damage associated with diseases such as multiple sclerosis (MS) and Parkinson’s disease. It is believed that more than one in ten Americans over age 65 suffer from incontinence, particularly women.

Several recent clinical trials in the past have indicated that cannabinoid therapy could reduce incidents of incontinence. Investigators at Oxford’s Centre for Enablement in Britain, writing in the February 2003 issue of the journal Clinical Rehabilitation, reported that bladder control was improved by self-administered doses of whole-plant cannabinoid extracts when compared to placebo in patients suffering from MS and spinal cord injury.

These initial findings were followed by investigators at London’s Institute for Neurology in an open-label pilot study of cannabis-based extracts for bladder dysfunction in 15 patients with advanced multiple sclerosis. Investigators determined “urinary urgency, the number of and volume of incontinence episodes, frequency, and nocturia all decreased significantly” following cannabinoid therapy. “Cannabis-based medicinal extracts are a safe and effective treatment for urinary and other problems in patients with advanced MS.”

A multi-center, randomized placebo-controlled trial involving 630 patients administered oral doses of cannabis extracts or THC confirmed these findings in 2006. It was reported by researchers that subjects administered cannabis extracts experienced a 38 percent reduction in incontinence episodes from baseline to the end of treatment, while patients administered THC experienced a 33 percent reduction, suggesting a “clinical effect of cannabis on incontinence episodes.

“In light of these findings, experts have recommended the use of cannabinoids as potential ‘second-line’ agents to treat incontinence.

References:

[1] Wade et al. 2003. A preliminary controlled study to determine whether whole-plant cannabis extracts can improve intractable neurogenic symptoms. Clinical Rehabilitation 17: 21-29.
[2] Brady et al. 2004. An open label pilot study of cannabis-based extracts for bladder dysfunction in advanced multiple sclerosis. Multiple Sclerosis 10: 425-433.
[3] Freeman et al. 2006. The effect of cannabis on urge incontinence in patients with multiple sclerosis: a multicentre, randomized placebo-controlled trial. The International Urogynecology Journal 17: 636-641.
[4] University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Press Release. May 21, 2006. ” Marijuana-derived drug suppresses bladder pain in animal models.”
[5] Kalsi and Fowler. 2005. Therapy insight: bladder dysfunction associated with multiple sclerosis. Nature Clinical Practice Neurology 2: 492-501.

Gastrointestinal (GI) disorders, including functional bowel diseases such as inflammatory bowel diseases (Crohn’s disease and colitis) and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) afflict more than one in five Americans, particularly women. While some of the disorders could be prevented by diet and pharmaceutical medications, others are poorly moderated by conventional treatments.

 The symptoms of gastrointestinal disorders often include cramping, abdominal pain, inflammation of the lining of the large and/or small intestine, rectal bleeding, chronic diarrhea, and weight loss.

Though several anecdotal reports and a handful of case reports exist in the scientific literature supporting the use of cannabinoids for treating symptoms of this disorder, virtually no clinical trial work has been performed in this area, aside from a 2007 clinical study assessing the impact of oral THC on colonic motility.

Nevertheless, it has been demonstrated by numerous preclinical studies that activation of the CB1 and CB2 cannabinoid receptors exert biological functions on the gastrointestinal tract. In animals, effects of their activation include suppression of gastrointestinal motility, reduced acid reflux, inhibition of intestinal secretion, protection from inflammation, and promotion of epithelial wound healing in human tissue.

As a result, it is believed by many experts that cannabinoids and/or modulation of the endogenous cannabinoid system represents a novel therapeutic approach for the treatment of numerous GI disorders — including inflammatory bowel diseases, functional bowel diseases, gastro-oesophagael reflux conditions, secretory diarrhea, gastric ulcers, and colon cancer.

References:
[1] Gahlinger, Paul M. 1984. Gastrointestinal illness and cannabis use in a rural Canadian community. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 16: 263-265.
[2] Swift et al. 2005. Survey of Australians using cannabis for medical purposes. Harm Reduction Journal 4: 2-18.
[3] Baron et al. 1990. Ulcerative colitis and marijuana. Annals of Internal Medicine 112: 471.
[4] Jeff Hergenrather. 2005. Cannabis alleviates symptoms of Crohn’s Disease. O’Shaughnessy’s 2: 3.
[5] Esfandyari et al. 2007. Effects of a cannabinoid receptor agonist on colonic motor and sensory functions in humans: a randomized, placebo-controlled study. American Journal of Physiology, Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology 293: 137-145.
[6] Massa and Monory. 2006. Endocannabinoids and the gastrointestinal tract. Journal of Endocrinological Investigation 29 (Suppl): 47-57.
[7] Roger Pertwee. 2001. Cannabinoids and the gastrointestinal tract. Gut 48: 859-867.
[8] DiCarlo and Izzo. 2003. Cannabinoids for gastrointestinal diseases: potential therapeutic applications. Expert Opinion on Investigational Drugs 12: 39-49.
[9] Lehmann et al. 2002. Cannabinoid receptor agonism inhibits transient lower esophageal sphincter relaxations and reflux in dogs. Gastroenterology 123: 1129-1134.
[10] Massa et al. 2005. The endocannabinoid system in the physiology and pathophysiology of the gastrointestinal tract. Journal of Molecular Medicine 12: 944-954.
[11] Wright et al. 2005. Differential expression of cannabinoid receptors in the human colon: cannabinoids promote epithelial wound healing. Gastroenterology 129: 437-453.
[12] Massa and Monory. 2006. op. cit.
[13] Izzo and Coutts. 2005. Cannabinoids and the digestive tract. Handbook of Experimental Pharmacology 168: 573-598.
[14] Izzo et al. 2009. Non-psychotropic plant cannabinoids: new therapeutic opportunities from an ancient herb. Trends in Pharmacological Sciences 30: 515-527.

The call to legalize marijuana continues to grow louder despite opposition by some sections of the society. The point of laugh is that these sections of the society (the latter category) believe marijuana has no medicinal properties despite no valid reasons or proof to justify, and are trying to override numerous studies in the scientific and medical literature’s about the usefulness of marijuana to treat health complications, ranging from mild to severe.

Even independent labs and government agencies have confirmed that marijuana does not constitute a danger to public safety and is the safest and the most useful drug known to the mankind. If marijuana was bad, why does the U.S. federal government owns a patent (number 6630507) for the medicinal use of marijuana? Time for a rethink!

The Drug Enforcement Administration’s own administrative law judge, Francis L. Young, held that “marijuana has been accepted as capable of relieving the distress of great numbers of very ill people, and doing so with safety under medical supervision. It would be unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious for DEA to continue to stand between those sufferers and the benefits of this substance in light of the evidence in this record.”

It is worthwhile to note here that marijuana, unlike other drugs, is quite safe to be used recreationally by responsible adults. Moreover, it is non-addictive in nature, has not caused a single death, and could not be over-dosed. If that is not all, medical marijuana has been allowing patients across the world.

Marijuana has been and is commonly used for treating health diseases such as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), chemotherapy-related nausea, migraine, depression, skin cancer, prostate cancer, lung cancer, breast cancer, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), autism, multiple sclerosis, and trauma.  In addition to this, medical marijuana has also demonstrated effectiveness in treating complications such as stuttering, HIV, AIDS, post polio syndrome, malignant melanoma, testicular cancer, diabetic peripheral vascular disease, obesity, autoimmune diseases, schizophrenia, writers’ cramp, alcohol abuse, tobacco dependence, Tourette’s syndrome, and persistent insomnia.

Medical studies have also confirmed that marijuana shows great promise in offering significant relief to patients suffering from nightmares, non-psychotic organic brain disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy, paralysis, Bell’s palsy, muscular dystrophies, glaucoma, and chronic sinusitis.

In addition to these medical benefits, legalizing marijuana could easily open new avenues of employment and wealth from an economy’s point of view. By regulating and taxing marijuana, the United States alone could earn $40 billion to $100 billion in new revenue. Moreover, legalization of marijuana could easily prevent drug users and sellers from being termed as “criminals.” Legalizing marijuana would also promote entrepreneurial spirit among marijuana sellers and help them become respectable and accepted individuals in our society. In addition to that, governments could easily control how marijuana is consumed by increasing or decreasing the taxes on the drug, once it is legalized.

With governments scrambling to identify new sources of revenue to pay for important social objectives and recession hitting almost every segment of the economy, the time is not far when the nature’s great gift (marijuana) would be legalized. This is primarily because legalization of marijuana would inevitably add a new and powerful industry to our draining economy.

All in all, legalizing marijuana is the best thing that could be done to save the mankind from diseases, constraints, and stigma.

References:

Marijuanainfo.com
Marijuana Mission
Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) Library
MedicalMJ.org – Medical Marijuana News and Facts
Students for Sensible Drug Policy
The Drug Reform Coordination Network
The Hemp & Cannabis Foundation

What would be better than a new economic foundation that is based on renewable energy sources? Wouldn’t it be better to create thousands of jobs by a stroke of the pen? By classifying marijuana (also known as hemp and cannabis) as a medicine and granting the legal status, the world would surely be a better place to live.

Marijuana is one of the most commonly used drugs across the world, yet it is given an illegal status by some countries. The valid reason for this illegality is none and the valid reasons for granting it the legal status are endless.

If you have been wondering why marijuana is an illegal drug, this is because big pharmaceuticals are threatened by marijuana, the wonder drug, which could be used to treat almost every medical complication known to the mankind. Drug cartels in Mexico and beer distributors in California opposed the legalization of marijuana as they feared it would reduce their profits.

If that is not all, some politicians oppose legalization of marijuana as they are afraid they will be accused of being “pro-drug”, labeled as weak on crime, and believe that marijuana is not a wonder drug (even if that means overriding scientific and medical evidences without any valid reason and proof). Moreover, how would court expenses that are paid by marijuana offenders be justified and how would the police departments justify their budgets fighting marijuana and making a lot of money by seizing property during marijuana busts?

Why Legalize Marijuana?
Legalization of marijuana would not only create thousands of jobs based on a clean and sustainable source of fuel, medicine, and fiber, but it would also help the treasury earn taxes worth billions. Moreover, legalizing marijuana would save taxpayers’ money by the elimination of the money spent on law enforcement, the courts, and the prisons. More importantly, it would help individuals and families who have been criminalized by a system that promotes arrests, fines, and confiscation.

Legalizing marijuana would not only restore social consent and help billions of people worldwide get cured of medical complications, but to also avoid lives of people getting ruined by unjustified arrest and confiscation.

The belief that people who advocate marijuana use are either uninformed or their jobs depend upon the mandatory acceptance of marijuana prohibition is nothing but a pure myth. This is primarily because the laws against marijuana are arbitrary, unjust, and wrong and the findings that gave birth to these laws are biased towards big pharmaceutical companies that are threatened by the greatest gift of the Mother Nature, marijuana.

The findings of the Canadian Senate Special Committee (on Illegal Drugs. 2002. Cannabis: Summary Report: Our Position for a Canadian Public Policy. Ottawa) says it all. “We believe … that the continued prohibition of cannabis jeopardizes the health and well-being of Canadians much more than does the substance itself or the regulated marketing of the substance. In addition, we believe that the continued criminalization of cannabis undermines the fundamental values set out in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and confirmed in the history of a country based on diversity and tolerance.

… It is for this reason that the Committee recommends that the Government of Canada amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to create a criminal exemption scheme, under which the production and sale of cannabis would be licensed, [and] … to permit persons over the age of 16 to procure cannabis and its derivatives at duly licensed distribution centers.”

In short, marijuana prohibition is nothing but unjust, the epitome of unwarranted big government intrusion into and interference with our private lives, and a huge waste of police, legal, and taxpayer resources. The time is not far when marijuana would be made easily accessible for adults who choose to use it, whether for medical use or pleasure and relaxation.

References:

Dr David Bearman’s Home Page
Dr Tod Mikuriya’s Home Page
Eugene (Oregon) – Compassion Center
Falcon Cove Biology Laboratory
Forfeiture Endangers American Rights

Marijuana is nothing but a wonder drug when it comes to offering relief to the mankind, especially to those suffering from health complications, ranging from multiple sclerosis to the dreaded cancer.

The term medical marijuana took on a dramatic new meaning in February 2000 when researchers in Madrid made an announcement that they had destroyed incurable brain cancer tumors in rats by injecting them with the active ingredient in cannabis, THC.
It was revealed:

“All the rats left untreated uniformly died 12-18 days after glioma (brain cancer) cell inoculation … Cannabinoid (THC)-treated rats survived significantly longer than control rats. THC administration was ineffective in three rats, which died by days 16-18. Nine of the THC-treated rats surpassed the time of death of untreated rats, and survived up to 19-35 days. Moreover, the tumor was completely eradicated in three of the treated rats.”

In a local section of the Washington Post on August 18, 1974, under the headline, “Cancer Curb Is Studied,” it was reported, “The active chemical agent in marijuana curbs the growth of three kinds of cancer in mice and may also suppress the immunity reaction that causes rejection of organ transplants, a Medical College of Virginia team has discovered.” The researchers “found that THC slowed the growth of lung cancers, breast cancers and a virus-induced leukemia in laboratory mice, and prolonged their lives by as much as 36 percent.”

The Spanish researchers were led by Dr. Manuel Guzman of Complutense University and the findings were reported in an issue of “Nature Medicine.”
The following studies also demonstrated that marijuana is highly effective in treating cancer.

1. “Cannabinoids, the active components of Cannabis sativa and their derivatives, act in the organism by mimicking endogenous substances, the endocannabinoids, that activate specific cannabinoid receptors. Cannabinoids exert palliative effects in patients with cancer and inhibit tumour growth in laboratory animals.
“The best-established palliative effect of cannabinoids in cancer patients is the inhibition of chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting. ….
“Other potential palliative effects of cannabinoids in cancer patients — supported by Phase III clinical trials — include appetite stimulation and pain inhibition. ….
“Cannabinoids inhibit tumor growth in laboratory animals. They do so by modulating key cell-signaling pathways, thereby inducing direct growth arrest and death of tumor cells, as well as by inhibiting tumor angiogenesis and metastasis.

“Cannabinoids are selective antitumor compounds, as they can kill tumor cells without affecting their non-transformed counterparts. It is probable that cannabinoid receptors regulate cell-survival and cell-death pathways differently in tumor and non-tumor cells.
“Cannabinoids have favorable drug-safety profiles and do not produce the generalized toxic effects of conventional chemotherapies. … “

Source:
Guzman, Manuel, “Cannabinoids: Potential Anticancer Agents.” Nature Reviews: Cancer (October 2003), p. 746.

http://www.brainlife.org/reprint/2003/guzm%C3%A1n_m031000.pdf

2. “Our results, which were obtained in a clinically relevant animal model of ErbB2-positive breast cancer, suggest that these highly aggressive and low responsive tumors could be efficiently treated with nonpsychoactive CB2-selective agonists without affecting the surrounding healthy tissue.”
From the abstract: “Conclusions: Taken together, these results provide a strong preclinical evidence for the use of cannabinoid-based therapies for the management of ErbB2-positive breast cancer.”

Sources:
Caffarel, María M; Andradas, Clara; Mira, Emilia; Pérez-Gómez, Eduardo; Cerutti; Camilla; Moreno-Bueno, Gema; Flores, Juana; García-Realm, Isabel; Palacios, José; Mañes, Santos; Guzmán, Manuel; Sánchez, Cristina, “Cannabinoids reduce ErbB2-driven breast cancer progression through Akt inhibition,” Molecular Cancer (London, United Kingdom: July 22, 2010), p. 1 and P. 8.

http://www.molecular-cancer.com/content/9/1/196

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2917429/pdf/1476-4598-9-196.pdf

3. “In conclusion, our data indicate that cannabidiol, and possibly Cannabis extracts enriched in this natural cannabinoid, represent a promising nonpsychoactive antineoplastic strategy. In particular, for a highly malignant human breast carcinoma cell line, we have shown here that cannabidiol and a cannabidiol-rich extract counteract cell growth both in vivo and in vitro as well as tumor metastasis in vivo. Cannabidiol exerts its effects on these cells through a combination of mechanisms that include either direct or indirect activation of CB2 and TRPV1 receptors and induction of oxidative stress, all contributing to induce apoptosis.”

Source:
Ligresti, Alessia; Moriello, Aniello Schiano; Starowicz, Katarzyna; Matias, Isabel; Pisanti, Simona; De Petrocellis, Luciano; Laezza, Chiara; Portella, Giuseppe; Bifulco, Maurizio; and Di Marzo, Vincenzo, “Antitumor Activity of Plant Cannabinoids with Emphasis on the Effect of Cannabidiol on Human Breast Carcinoma,” The Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (Bethesda, MD: The American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, March 2004) Vol. 318, No. 3, pp. 1386-1387.

http://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/318/3/1375.full.pdf
4. “… we show that cannabinoid administration selectively down-regulates MMP-2 [matrix metalloproteinases] expression in mice bearing gliomas as well as in two patients with recurrent glioblastoma multiforme. Cannabinoid-induced inhibition of MMP-2 expression was also evident in cultured glioma cells, indicating that the changes observed in gliomas in vivo reflect—at least in part—the direct effect of cannabinoids on tumor cells. MMP-2 expression is upregulated in almost all human cancers, including gliomas, and this has been shown to be closely associated with negative prognosis.”

“As MMP-2 up-regulation is associated with high progression and poor prognosis of gliomas and many other tumors, MMP-2 downregulation constitutes a new hallmark of cannabinoid antitumoral activity.”

Source:
Cristina Bla´zquez, Mari´a Salazar, Arkaitz Carracedo, Mar Lorente, Ainara Egia, Luis Gonza´lez-Feria, Amador Haro, Guillermo Velasco, and Manuel Guzman, “Cannabinoids Inhibit Glioma Cell Invasion by Down-regulating Matrix Metalloproteinase-2 Expression,” Cancer Research (March 2008), pp. 1951 and 1945.

http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/68/6/1945.pdf

5. “Cannabinoids have a favourable drug safety profile. Acute fatal cases due to cannabis use in humans have not been substantiated, and median lethal doses of THC in animals have been extrapolated to several grams per kilogram of body weight. Cannabinoids are usually well tolerated in animal studies and do not produce the generalized toxic effects of most conventional chemotherapeutic agents. For example, in a 2-year administration of high oral doses of THC to rats and mice, no marked histopathological alterations in the brain and other organs were found. Moreover, THC treatment tended to increase survival and lower the incidence of primary tumours. Similarly, long-term epidemiological surveys, although scarce and difficult to design and interpret, usually show that neither patients under prolonged medical cannabinoid treatment nor regular cannabis smokers have marked alterations in a wide array of physiological, neurological and blood tests.”

Source:
Guzman, Manuel, “Cannabinoids: Potential Anticancer Agents.” Nature Reviews: Cancer (October 2003), p. 752.

http://www.brainlife.org/reprint/2003/guzm%C3%A1n_m031000.pdf

6. “Cannabinoids, the active components of marijuana and their other natural and synthetic analogues have been reported as useful adjuvants to conventional chemotherapeutic regimens for preventing nausea, vomiting, pain, and for stimulating appetite. Before the discovery of specific cannabinoid systems and receptors, it was speculated that cannabinoids produced their effects via nonspecific interaction with cell membranes. Cannabinoids are proving to be unique based on their targeted action on cancer cells and their ability to spare normal cells. Variation in the effects of cannabinoids in different cell lines and tumor model could be due to the differential expression of CB1 and CB2 receptors. Thus, overexpression of cannabinoid receptors may be effective in killing tumors, whereas low or no expression of these receptors could lead to cell proliferation and metastasis because of the suppression of the antitumor immune response.”

Source:
Sarfaraz, Sami; Adhami, Vaqar M.; Syed, Deeba N.; Afaq, Farrukh; and Mukhtar, Hasan, “Cannabinoids for Cancer Treatment: Progress and Promise,” Cancer Research (Philadelphia, PA: American Association for Cancer Research, January 2008) Vol. 68, pp. 341-342.

http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/reprint/68/2/339.pdf

Researchers have found that Delta9-tetrahydrocannabinol and cannabidiol (CBD), two plant-derived cannabinoids, are neuroprotective in an animal model of Parkinson’s disease (PD), presumably because of their antioxidant properties.

The neuroprotective effects of a series of cannabinoid-based compounds with more selectivity for different elements of the cannabinoid signaling system in rats with unilateral lesions of nigrostriatal dopaminergic neurons caused by local application of 6-hydroxydopamine were evaluated for the research purposes.

The CB1 receptor agonist arachidonyl-2-chloroethylamide (ACEA), the CB2 receptor agonist HU-308, the non-selective agonist WIN55, 212-2, and the inhibitors of the endocannabinoid inactivation AM404 and UCM707 were used and all of them administered i.p. Daily administration of ACEA or WIN55, 212-2 did not reverse 6-hydroxydopamine-induced dopamine (DA) depletion in the lesioned side, whereas HU-308 produced a minor recovery supporting a likely involvement of CB2 but not CB1 receptors.

AM404 produced a significant recovery of 6-hydroxydopamine-induced DA depletion and tyrosine hydroxylase deficit in the lesioned side, possibly caused by the antioxidant properties of AM404. The AM404 properties are derived from the presence of a phenolic group in its structure, rather than by the capability of AM404 to block the endocannabinoid transporter as another transporter inhibitor devoid of antioxidant properties, UCM707, did not produce the same effect.

The researchers also evaluated the timing for the effect of CBD in offering 6-hydroxydopamine-induced DA depletion when it was administered immediately after the lesion. However, it failed to do that when treatment was initiated a week later. Moreover, the effect of CBD implied an upregulation of mRNA levels for Cu, Zn-superoxide dismutase, a key enzyme in endogenous defenses against oxidative stress.

In short, the results indicate that those cannabinoids having antioxidant cannabinoid receptor-independent properties offer neuroprotection against the progressive degeneration of nigrostriatal dopaminergic neurons occurring in PD. Furthermore, the activation of CB2 (but not CB1) receptors, or other additional mechanisms, may also contribute to some extent to the potential of cannabinoids in Parkinson’s disease.

The study was conducted by García-Arencibia M, González S, de Lago E, Ramos JA, Mechoulam R, Fernández-Ruiz J. from Departamento de Bioquímica y Biología Molecular III, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Complutense, 28040-Madrid, Spain.

Reference:
Brain Res., 2007 Feb 23;1134(1):162-70

Diabetes mellitus is a group of autoimmune diseases characterized by defects in insulin secretion that results in an abnormally high concentration of glucose in the blood, hyperglycemia. There are two types of diabetes.

Type 1 diabetes: People diagnosed with type 1 diabetes (also known as juvenile diabetes) are incapable to produce pancreatic insulin and must rely on insulin medication to survive.

Type 2 diabetes: People diagnosed with type 2 diabetes (also known as adult onset diabetes) produce inadequate insulin amounts.

Over a period of time, diabetes could result in blindness, kidney failure, nerve damage, hardening of the arteries, and even death.

A search of the scientific literature identified a small number of preclinical studies that indicated cannabinoids may modify the disease’s progression and provide symptomatic relief to those suffering from it.

Injections of 5 mg per day of the non-psychoactive cannabinoid CBD significantly minimized the incidence of diabetes in mice, according to a 2006 study published in the journal Autoimmunity. It was reported by investigators that 86% of untreated control mice in the study developed diabetes and only 30% of CBD-treated mice developed the disease, by contrast.

Researchers at the Medical College of Virginia while writing in the March 2006 issue of the American Journal of Pathology reported that rats treated with CBD for periods of one to four weeks experienced significant protection from diabetic retinopathy.
A pair of studies published in the journal Neuroscience Letters in 2004 suggested that “cannabinoids have a potential beneficial effect on experimental diabetic neuropathic pain.”

References:
[1] Croxford and Yamamura. 2005. Cannabinoids and the immune system: Potential for the treatment of inflammatory diseases. Journal of Neuroimmunology 166: 3-18.
[2] Lu et al. 2006. The cannabinergic system as a target for anti-inflammatory therapies. Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry 13: 1401-1426.
[3] Weiss et al. 2006. Cannabidiol lowers incidence of diabetes in non-obese diabetic mice. Autoimmunity 39: 143-151.
[4] Ibid
[5] El-Remessy et al. 2006. Neuroprotective and blood-retinal barrier preserving effects of cannabidiol in experimental diabetes. American Journal of Pathology 168: 235-244.
[6] Dogrul et al. 2004. Cannabinoids block tactile allodynia in diabetic mice without attenuation of its antinociceptive effect. Neuroscience Letters 368: 82-86.
[7] Ulugol et al. 2004. The effect of WIN 55,212-2, a cannabinoid agonist, on tactile allodynia in diabetic rats. Neuroscience Letters 71: 167-170.
[8] Li et al. 2001. Examination of the immunosuppressive effect of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol in streptozotocin-induced autoimmune diabetes. International Immunopharmacology (Italy) 4: 699-712.
[9] Rajesh et al. 2010. Cannabidiol attenuates cardiac dysfunction, oxidative stress, fibrosis, and inflammatory and cell death signaling pathways in diabetic cardiomyopathy. Journal of the American College of Cardiology 56: 2115-2125.

Laws legalizing medical marijuana have resulted in a nearly nine percent drop in traffic deaths and a five percent reduction in beer sales, according to a groundbreaking study.

“Our research suggests that the legalization of medical marijuana reduces traffic fatalities through reducing alcohol consumption by young adults,” said Daniel Rees, professor of economics at the University of Colorado Denver who co-authored the study with D. Mark Anderson, assistant professor of economics at Montana State University.

Data from a variety of sources including the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, and the Fatality Analysis Reporting System was collected by the researchers. This is the first study for examining the relationship between the legalization of medical marijuana and traffic deaths.
“We were astounded by how little is known about the effects of legalizing medical marijuana,” Rees said. “We looked into traffic fatalities because there is good data, and the data allow us to test whether alcohol was a factor.”

Traffic deaths are significant from a policy standpoint, noted Anderson. “Traffic fatalities are an important outcome from a policy perspective because they represent the leading cause of death among Americans ages five to 34,” he said.

It was cautioned by Rees and Anderson that legalization of medical marijuana may result in fewer traffic deaths as it is typically used in private, while alcohol is often consumed at bars and restaurants.

“I think this is a very timely study given all the medical marijuana laws being passed or under consideration,” Anderson said. “These policies have not been research-based thus far and our research shows some of the social effects of these laws. Our results suggest a direct link between marijuana and alcohol consumption.”

“Although we make no policy recommendations, it certainly appears as though medical marijuana laws are making our highways safer,” Rees said.

Reference:
D. Mark Anderson, Daniel I. Rees. Medical Marijuana Laws, Traffic Fatalities, and Alcohol Consumption. IZA Discussion Paper, November 2011

A neurological movement disorder characterized by abnormal muscle tension and involuntary and painful muscle contractions, Dystonia, is the third most common movement disorder after Parkinson’s disease and tremor that affects more than 300,000 people in North America.

Recent scientific literature provides references to a small number of case reports and preclinical studies investigating the use of cannabis and cannabinoids for symptoms of dystonia.

A 2002 case study published in the July issue of The Journal of Pain and Symptom Management reported improved dystonia symptoms in a 42-year-old chronic pain patient after smoking marijuana. It was reported by the investigators that subjective pain score of the subject ell from 9 to zero (on a zero-to-10 visual analog scale) following cannabis inhalation and that no additional analgesic medication for the following 48 hours was required by the subject. “No other treatment intervention to date had resulted in such dramatic overall improvement in [the patient's] condition,” investigators concluded.

A second case study that reported “significant clinical improvement” following cannabis inhalation in a single 25-year-old patient with generalized dystonia because of Wilson’s disease was documented by an Argentinean research team in the August 2004 issue of the journal Movement Disorders.

A German research team at the Hannover Medical School reported successful treatment of musician’s dystonia in a 38-year-old professional pianist following administration of 5 mg of THC in a placebo-controlled single-dose trial in 2004. The investigators reported “clear improvement of motor control” in the subject’s affected hand, and noted, “[Two] hours after THC intake, the patient was able to play technically demanding literature, which had not been possible before treatment.” The subject had been unresponsive to standard medications and was no longer performing publicly prior to cannabinoid treatment. “The results provide evidence that … THC intake … significantly improves [symptoms of] … focal dystonia,” investigators concluded.

References:
[1] Chatterjee et al. 2002. A dramatic response to inhaled cannabis in a woman with central thalamic pain and dystonia. The Journal of Pain and Symptom Management 24: 4-6.
[2] Roca et al. 2004. Cannabis sativa and dystonia secondary to Wilson’s disease. Movement Disorders 20: 113-115.
[3] Jabusch et al. 2004. Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol improves motor control in a patient with musician’s dystonia (PDF). Movement Disorders 19: 990-991.
[4] Fox et al. 2002. Randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to assess the potential of cannabinoid receptor stimulation in the treatment of dystonia. Movement Disorders 17: 145-149.
[5] Richter et al. 2002. Effects of pharmacological manipulations of cannabinoid receptors on severe dystonia in a genetic model of paroxysmal dyskinesia. European Journal of Pharmacology 454: 145-151.
[6] Consroe et al. 1986. Open label evaluation of cannabidiol in dystonic movement disorders. International Journal of Neuroscience 30: 277-282.
[7] Richter et al. 1994. (+)-WIN 55212-2, a novel cannabinoid agonist, exerts antidystonic effects in mutant dystonic hamsters. European Journal of Pharmacology 264: 371-377.

In recent times, cannabinoids have emerged as a possible treatment option for stress and anxiety-related disorders such as post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A research was aimed to examine whether cannabinoid receptor activation may inhibit the effects of traumatic stress on the development of behavioral and neuroendocrine measures in a rat model of PTSD, the single-prolonged stress (SPS) model.

During the research, rats were injected with the CB1/CB2 receptor agonist WIN55,212-2 (WIN) systemically or into the basolateral amygdala (BLA) at varying time points following SPS exposure and were tested a week later for inhibitory avoidance (IA) conditioning and extinction, acoustic startle response (ASR), hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis function, and anxiety levels.

It was revealed that SPS exposure improved conditioned avoidance and impaired extinction while increasing ASR, negative feedback on the HPA axis, and anxiety. WIN (0.5 mg/kg) administered intraperitoneally 2 or 24 h (but not 48 h) after SPS inhibited the trauma-induced alterations in IA conditioning and extinction, ASR potentiation, and HPA axis inhibition. SPS-induced alterations in IA and ASR were prevented by WIN microinjected into the BLA (5 μg/side). The effects were blocked by intra-BLA co-administration of the CB1 receptor antagonist AM251 (0.3 ng/side) and suggested the involvement of CB1 receptors.

It was suggested by the findings that there could be an optimal time-window for intervention treatment with cannabinoids after a highly-stressful event exposure and some preventive effects induced by WIN are possible of being mediated by the activation of CB1 receptors in the BLA. It was also revealed by the research findings that cannabinoids may serve as a pharmacological treatment of stress and trauma-related disorders.

Reference:
Department of Psychology, University of Haifa, Haifa, Israel

Despite fierce opposition from the federal government, efforts for legalizing marijuana for recreational use gaining momentum in Colorado and Washington state. Recently, officials in Washington remarked that an initiative for legalizing pot has enough signatures to get qualified for the ballot in November. Officials in Colorado are about to make a similar determination about an initiative in the state.

Pot supporters are ready to possibly spend millions of dollars ahead of the ballot in November, when they are hoping for a strong voter turnout, especially among youth, for the U.S. presidential election will aid their cause.

“Whether it’s make or break depends on what public opinion does after 2012, but in terms of voter turnout this is the best year to do it,” said Alison Holcomb, director of New Approach Washington, the initiative’s sponsor.

Marijuana use for medical purposes is presently being allowed in 16 states, including Washington and Colorado, along with the national capital. However, cannabis still remains an illegal narcotic under U.S. law and opinion of public is sharply divided on the merits of full marijuana legalization.

The U.S. Department of Justice has cracked down on medical cannabis operations in California after voters from the state turned back a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana for recreational use in 2010.

“Our highest priority are the folks that violate both state and federal law,” said Rusty Payne, spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration. “There are places that have made a lot of money who claim to be nonprofit, and they have faced both local and federal scrutiny.”

Supporters of the Washington state initiative in an undeterred manner said it represents the “grown-up” approach to legalization.

“Voters aren’t being asked to imagine as much as they are in other states, they have seen that marijuana can be regulated and it doesn’t result in significant problems,” said Mason Tvert, co-director of the Colorado-based Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol.

Public disclosure records show that Washington effort organizers have been able to collect over $1.1 million in campaign funds, with $250,000 of that coming from Progressive Insurance chairman Peter Lewis.
“If young voters turn out in droves like they did in 2008 or even start to approach those numbers … then I think this will pass, but they very well may not,” said Loren Collingwood, senior researcher for the nonpartisan Washington Poll run by the University of Washington.

“There’s a set of factors that suggest both the Washington and Colorado initiates have a better chance of winning than any of the initiatives that have happened before,” said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance.

“But that said, even with a majority of likely voters in both states saying they favor legal marijuana, we know in the final stretch there’s always a small percentage that get nervous or scared off or fearful of change,” he said.

Legalization “is not good for states and citizens who live in those states, and it’s certainly not good for the outlook of children who live in those states,” said Calivina Fay, head of the Florida-based Drug Free America Foundation.

“Right now in Seattle, we’re feeling that it’s a bit unfair that we are being tolerant of medical cannabis users, when other localities are not, because we tend to become suppliers for the whole state rather than our own citizens,” said Washington City Attorney Peter Holmes.

The constituents of marijuana smoke, cannabinoids, have potential anti-tumor properties and the use of marijuana has now been associated with reduced risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC).

A recent study found that 10 to 20 years of marijuana use was associated with a significantly reduced risk of HNSCC [odds ratio (OR) 10-<20 years versus never users, 0.38; 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.22-0.67] after adjusting for potential confounders (including smoking and alcohol drinking). Moderate weekly use was associated with reduced risk (OR0.5-<1.5 times versus <0.5 time, 0.52; 95% CI, 0.32-0.85) among users of marijuana.

The magnitude of minimized risk was more pronounced for those started marijuana use at an older age (OR15-<20 years versus never users, 0.53; 95% CI, 0.30-0.95; OR≥20 years versus never users, 0.39; 95% CI, 0.17-0.90; Ptrend < 0.001). The involved researchers observed attenuated risk of HNSCC among those who use marijuana compared with those who do not or the subjects who have the same level of smoking or alcohol drinking.

The study suggested that moderate marijuana use is linked with reduced risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. This study was supported by grant from the NIH (CA078609, CA100679) and Flight Attendants Medical Research Institute.

The study findings on whether legalizing medical marijuana in Rhode Island would be increasing its use among youths were presented by a Rhode Island Hospital physician/researcher.

Lead author Esther Choo, M.D., M.P.H., presented the findings of the study at the American Public Health Association Annual Meeting and Exposition on November 2.

The state-level legalization of medical marijuana has raised concerns about increased accessibility and appeal of the drug to youth, who are most vulnerable to public messages about drug use and to the adverse consequences of marijuana, Choo, an emergency medicine physician with Rhode Island Hospital, and her coauthors explained. Their study was performed for assessing the impact of medical marijuana legalization in Rhode Island in 2006.

Trends in adolescent marijuana use between Rhode Island and Massachusetts, using a self-report called the Youth Risk Behavioral Surveillance System, were compared by researchers. In their study, they included surveys completed between 1997 and 2009.
It was found by the researchers based on their analysis of 32,570 students that while marijuana use was common throughout the study period, there were no statistically significant differences in marijuana use between states in any year.

Choo says, “Our study did not find increases in adolescent marijuana use related to Rhode Island’s 2006 legalization of medical marijuana; however, additional research may follow future trends as medical marijuana in Rhode Island and other states becomes more widely used.”

Under a new Washington state law that will be enforced soon, the City Council recently voted for instituting a municipal licensing and regulation system for the distribution of medical marijuana in Seattle. The regulation is said to be signed and approved by the Mayor of Seattle Mike McGinn. It is contradictory to a sequence of new restrictions and prohibitions inflicted by other municipalities around the state on medical marijuana dispensaries and cultivation facilities.

Governor Christine Gregoire permitted cities for regulating and licensing the production, processing, and distribution of medical marijuana on a limited basis by signing a new measure in to law.

According to the bill, storefront dispensaries and other medical pot dealers are required for restructuring themselves as small, cooperative enterprises catering to approximately 10 patients. These “collective gardens” are limited to cultivating 45 plants in total and not exceeding more than 15 per person.

A recent increase in storefront dispensaries, neither permitted under a 1988 voter-approved scheme legalizing pot for medicinal purposes nor explicitly banned, caused the approval of the state law. Gregoire vetoed any provisions that would have established a license for the cultivation and distribution of medical marijuana at the state level.

It was argued by officials of Seattle (Washington’s largest city) backing the proposed city regulation that the ordinance will effectively regulate to the upcoming supply chain. Seattle Councilwoman Sally Clark said, “We’re saying, ‘You’re already here, now we need to regulate you.’”

Although Seattle has given rise to around 80 medical marijuana dispensaries, only about 50 of them have registered with the city, Clark said.

According to a professor at Thompson Rivers University’s Faculty of Law, there is no grey area as far as the legality of marijuana in Canada is concerned.

“I’m not sure how grey it is from a legal perspective,” Micah Rankin told KTW. “I think a lot of times police are using some restraint and discretion in not bothering to do anything, but it’s black and white insofar as this is not something that’s been challenged in the courts.”

Rankin, a teacher of criminal and constitutional law at TRU, spoke to KTW in the wake of last week’s RCMP raid on the Canadian Safe Cannabis Society (CSCS), which is a so-called compassion club on Tranquille Road.

Compassion clubs, sometimes referred to as marijuana dispensaries, are places where medical marijuana users access their drugs. The use of medical marijuana is legal in the country and drug access is available legitimately through Health Canada.
“It seems to me the problem is not using marijuana, but the problem is selling marijuana,” Rankin said.

CSCS staff and clients have said the facility provides marijuana only to people with Health Canada certification or a note from a doctor. Neither of those makes their sales legal, according to Health Canada.

Peter Lewis, one of the biggest backers of medical marijuana in the United States, is seeking proposals to conduct a ballot initiative campaign to legalize marijuana for medical use in Ohio.

According to the request for proposals, fifteen states have made marijuana legal for qualified patients, most through the passage of similar voter initiatives.

Lewis is presently pushing it through in his home state of Ohio.

“Of the states that continue to prohibit medical use of marijuana, Ohio stands out as having particularly high levels of voter support,” stated the RFP, “This provides an opportunity to enact a new law that will directly help patients and to do so in a manner that will serve as a model for other states.”

The goal of the proposals is not just to pass a voter initiative legalizing medical marijuana in Ohio but for designing a campaign that could create a model for future campaigns in other states.

“You shouldn’t take it as a given that there will be a ballot initiative this campaign,” said Graham Boyd, Lewis’ lawyer and adviser, “But we want to see proposals.”

Lewis has already given millions to Marijuana Policy Project, the reform group, including $900,000 in 2010 besides giving 200,000 in support of California’s Proposition 19, the bill that sought unsuccessfully last November to legalize marijuana in California.

According to researchers from Buffalo and Boston, a compound that is similar to chemicals found in marijuana can help a heavy smoker’s sperm bind to eggs more effectively. The finding was presented at an Annual Meeting of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.

The same researchers earlier wanted to find out whether treating sperms of a smoker with a marijuana-like compound might improve sperm binding. Sperms of humans have chemical receptors that respond to nicotine and marijuana-like compounds (cannabinoids).

The study involved eight volunteers, who were all heavy smokers. While four of them had normal sperm function, the remaining hour had reduced sperm function. Some of their sperm was washed in a regular medium and some was washed in a low-concentration cannabinoid solution. It was found that the sperm of smokers who had reduced sperm function improved to a significant extent after being washed in the low-concentration cannabinoid solution, while the sperm of the smokers with normal function did not.

Craig Niederberger, MD, President of the Society for Male Reproduction and Urology (SMRU) said, “Numerous studies have shown that tobacco smoking is harmful to parents, and to their unborn and living children. It is important to note that in this study, sperm were washed with the active chemical in marijuana, as it is also known that smoking or taking marijuana in other ways harms a man’s fertility. But the best way to improve a smoker’s overall health, his fertility, and the health of his family is to help him quit smoking.”

Reference:
L. J. Burkman, S. Tambar, A. Makriyannis, M. Bodziak, R. Mroz, B. Telesz
HIGHLIGHTS from the 62nd ANNUAL MEETING AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR REPRODUCTIVE MEDICINE

P 751, a potent synthetic analog of a metabolite of THC -the principal active ingredient of marijuana – is effective in suppressing pain in hypersensitive bladder disorders such as interstitial cystitis (IC), according to animal model study results presented today at the annual meeting of the American Urological Association.

The synthetic analog is a potent anti-inflammatory and a powerful analgesic and its administration directly into the bladder is difficult as it is insoluble in water.
Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine addressed the hydrophobic properties of IP 751 for the study with the introduction of the drug into a liposome, allowing for the drug to be introduced directly into the bladders of rat models of varying degrees of bladder inflammation. The bladder over-activity in both the animal models was significantly suppressed by IP 751.

“Interstitial cystitis is a difficult disease to treat, and not all treatments work well on all patients,” said Michael B. Chancellor, M.D., professor of urology and gynecology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “Any new option we can give our patients to alleviate their painful symptoms is very important.”

The study was supported by the NIH and the Fishbein Family Foundation Center of Urologic Research Excellence – Interstitial Cystitis (CURE-IC) Project.

Reference:
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center

Oregon regulators have given first-ever official US approval to a brand of medical marijuana hydroponics nutrients in a landmark decision.

Oregon and most other US states have regulatory agencies that evaluate fertilizers and hydroponics plant supplements for determining the legitimacy, ingredients, and effectiveness of plant growth products.

Advanced Nutrients co-founder Michael Straumietis welcomed the news that the government of Oregon proffered formal approval for an Advanced Nutrients formula designed for a specific strain of medical marijuana.

“Regulatory approval is a breakthrough for the medical marijuana community,” Straumietis explains. “For the first time, government regulators have examined and affirmed the use of crop-specific medical marijuana hydroponics nutrients.”

Regulators nationwide had apparently never considered how hydroponics nutrients specifically affect medical marijuana crops until Straumietis asked regulators for examining the effectiveness of medical marijuana and safety of Advanced Nutrients hydroponics formulas.

”It hasn’t been part of the discussion, until now,” Straumietis explains. “For example, when fertilizer regulators evaluate fertilizers that have labels claiming to produce larger tomatoes, they require specific efficacy data proving those claims. Now Oregon regulators have opened the door for formal evaluation of hydroponics nutrients and medical marijuana growth, quality and yield.”

The regulatory decision was applauded by Oregon medical marijuana patients, cultivators, doctors, and advocates who were previously citing their long-held concern that regulators were not looking at how hydroponics nutrients interact with medical marijuana.

“Advanced Nutrients and the medical marijuana community give kudos to Oregon regulators for being the first state regulators to evaluate the science of medical marijuana and hydroponics nutrients,” Straumietis says. “Our community is looking for similar action from regulators in other medical marijuana states.”

Reference:

Advanced Nutrients

Most drugs of abuse reduce the generation of new neurons in the brain, but the effects of marijuana on this process, known as neurogenesis, had not been clear.

In a paper that appeared online in advance of print publication of the November issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Xia Zhang and colleagues from University of Saskatchewan demonstrated that a potent and synthetic cannabinoid promotes neurogenesis besides exerting anti-anxiety and antidepressant-like effects.

It was suggested by the researchers that there is a positive correlation between increased adult neurogenesis and modified behavior following chronic cannabinoid treatment.

The offered data helped in expanding the present knowledge about the positive roles cannabinoids and their receptors play in brain processing and medicine. It was also revealed that cannabinoids is perhaps the only drug that can enhance adult neurogenesis and subsequently modify behavior.

Reference:
University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
Journal of Clinical Investigation
the-jci.org/article.php?id=25509

According to an anonymous survey, people qualifying for prescriptions of medical marijuana frequently report substituting the substance for their other prescription medications.

Sixty-six of 350 clients at the Berkeley (Calif.) Patients Group, a medical marijuana dispensary, remarked they use marijuana as a substitute for prescription drugs as they think it provided better symptom control with fewer side effects than did prescription drugs. Those with pain symptoms said marijuana has less addiction potential than opioids and others said it helped in reducing the dose of other medications.

Almost 50 percent of those surveyed said they use cannabis two or three times per day. More than 75 percent of respondents said they made use of cannabis for psychiatric disorders, including bipolar disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, and persistent insomnia. Dr. Reiman reported at the American Psychiatric Association’s Institute on Psychiatric Services that patients believe marijuana didn’t leave them feeling like “zombies.”

Dr. Reiman said about 75% had health insurance that covered prescriptions and “they are still opting to utilize medical cannabis, which is not covered by insurance.”
“Instead of having a pain medication, an antianxiety medication, and a sleep medication, they are able to just use cannabis, and that controls all of those symptoms,” said Amanda Reiman, Ph.D., the director of research and social services at the Berkeley center.

A proposal that was going to make licensed marijuana dispensaries was recently vetoed by Washington State Governor, Christine Gregoire. Gregoire said she would be working with other states and try to get a change in federal laws so that these types of conflicts will be resolved.

U.S. attorneys in their letters wrote that civil or criminal penalties would be considered for medical marijuana operations on a large-scale and those who regulate them, even those operations and regulators that are allowed by state law.

Lawmakers are now concerned about their current medical marijuana policies even though no state workers have been charged by the federal government for regulating medical marijuana. Presently, fourteen states in the United States of America permit marijuana for medical usage, despite it not being federally legal.

The WA governor said she wanted to collaborate with other governors and get medical marijuana federally reclassified as a Schedule 2 substance that would put it in the same category as morphine and oxycodone. Medical marijuana is presently a Schedule 1 narcotic, and has the strictest level of enforcement in federal drug law.

Tracy Schmaller, Justice Department spokeswoman said, “We will not tolerate drug traffickers who hide behind claims of compliance with state law to mask activities that are clearly illegal.” Ezra Eickmeyer, Washington Cannabis Association political director, said this about the recent events, “Coming in and trying to strong-arm legislatures is way over the top. We would have expected this sort of thing from the Bush administration, but not Obama.”

According to the National Drug Policy Alliance, fifteen states and the District of Columbia have statutes decriminalizing marijuana for medical reasons despite the fact that cannabis is still listed as an illegal narcotic under federal law.
In recent months, the Justice Department has taken a hard line against what it terms illegal drug activities conducted under the guise of state medical marijuana laws.

New state controls on medical marijuana cultivation and distribution would not render growers, dispensary operators or even their landlords and financiers immunity from federal prosecution and civil actions, as per Washington’s two U.S. attorneys, Jenny Durkan of Seattle and Michael Ormsby of Spokane in a legal opinion. They wrote that “state employees who conducted activities mandated by the Washington legislative proposals would not be immune from liability” from prosecution.

A marijuana chemical could protect against brain damage from a stroke, according to a report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Cannabidiol, the compound, in the test tube sops up damaging oxygen-free radicals more effectively than vitamins C and E, two of the most powerful known dietary antioxidants.

It is widely known that marijuana and its psychoactive component tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) inhibit the activity of certain brain regions. Aidan Hampson, working jointly with colleagues at the National Institute of Mental Health and elsewhere, set out for testing whether the inhibitory effects of THC might also prevent the toxic overstimulation of brain cells that results when the brain cells become starved for oxygen and sugar, and are then unable to pump out the neurotransmitter glutamate.

A stroke was simulated by researchers via bathing a petri dish full of neurons in the neurotransmitter glutamate that is toxic at high doses. Half as many neurons died when purified THC was added. It was first assumed by the researchers that THC was binding to the cannabinoid receptor but they found that THC still protected the cells when they added another chemical that blocks the receptor. “It shouldn’t have protected the neurons, but it worked just as well,” Hampson says.

THC was mopping up free radicals, such as hydrogen peroxide, that are spewed out by over-stimulated neurons, a fact that was noticed after further testing. It was also revealed that cannabidiol, a marijuana component similar to THC but lacking its psychoactive effects, provided the same antioxidant benefits.

Reference:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Researchers from the University of California’s Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research (CMCR) have found “reasonable evidence that cannabis is a promising treatment” for certain specific, pain-related medical conditions.

Their findings, presented recently to the California legislature and public, are included in a report available on the CMCR web site at http://www.cmcr.ucsd.edu
“We focused on illnesses where current medical treatment does not provide adequate relief or coverage of symptoms,” explained CMCR director, Igor Grant, MD, Executive Vice-Chair of the Department of Psychiatry at the UCSD School of Medicine. “These findings provide a strong, science-based context in which policy makers and the public can begin discussing the place of cannabis in medical care.”

Five scientific clinical trials, with more in progress, have been completed by researchers. It was revealed in the studies that cannabis could be beneficial in easing pain in selected syndromes caused by injury or diseases of the nervous system and possibly for painful muscle spasms due to multiple sclerosis.

“These scientists created an unparalleled program of systematic research, focused on science-based answers rather than political or social beliefs,” said Senator John Vasconcellos, original author of The Medical Marijuana Research Act of 1999 (SB847) which led to the creation of the CMCR.

Reference:
University of California – San Diego

According to a review of recent studies, cannabis doses could help multiple sclerosis (MS) patients subdue their body spasms and move about more easily. The paper authors, however, noted that the apparent relief of patients could also be a matter of perception.

The authors found “evidence that combined THC and CBD extracts may provide therapeutic benefit” after reviewing six trials that tested the effects of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD) extracts on muscle spasms in a total of 481 MS patients.

The researchers analyzed cannabis-taking patients reported decreases in their spasms in five of the six double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trials.
“The subjective experience of symptom reduction was generally found to be significant,” wrote the authors, based at the Global Neuroscience Initiative Foundation in Los Angeles. However, the authors conceded, “participants of both active and placebo trials may not be entirely blind to their treatment status, and this may affect subjective analysis.”

The authors concluded in the paper published online in the journal BMC Neurology that MS patients might not get a green light for this treatment just yet. “Objective measures of spasticity failed to provide significant changes.”

The authors of the recent paper, however, noted that a mixture of THC and CBD could limit psychotropic effects. In any case, it was found that for the MS patients in the studies at least, “side effects from combined extracts of THC and CBD were generally well tolerated.”

Reference:
BMC Neurology

A recent study examining the relationship between neuropsychological performance and three different indices of cannabis use in schizophrenia has revealed that use of cannabis is linked with enhanced cognitive functioning in schizophrenia.

The indices were DSM-IV lifetime abuse/dependence, frequency of use, and recency of use. Sixty males suffering from schizophrenia/schizoaffective disorder and 17 healthy males were recruited as part of the study. The two groups were matched for age, education years, and premorbid IQ and the researchers assessed medical history, substance use, and psychiatric symptoms of the recruits. A neuropsychological battery was also administered for assessing attention/processing speed, executive functions, memory, and perceptual organization. Substance use within twenty-four hours of cognitive assessment was screened by urine analysis, and a range of confounds were controlled.

It was revealed that 44 participants met DSM-IV criteria for lifetime cannabis abuse/dependence in the schizophrenia group and there were three mutually exclusive frequency-of-cannabis-use subgroups comprising “high” frequency users (n=11), “medium” frequency users (n=7), and “low” frequency users (n=34) over the preceding year. There were also four mutually exclusive recency-of-cannabis-use categories comprising “cannabis abuse/dependence in the past week” (n=11 users), “non-dependent cannabis use in the past week” (n=7 users), “non-dependent cannabis use in the past month, but prior to the past week” (n=7 users), and “non-dependent cannabis use prior to the past month” (n=9 users).

Moreover, the control group fared better than the schizophrenia group in all cognitive domains. A larger proportion of participants, within the schizophrenia group, with lifetime cannabis abuse/dependence demonstrated better performance than those without lifetime abuse/dependence on a component of psychomotor speed.
Recency and frequency of cannabis use were also linked with improved neuropsychological performance, predominantly in the domains of attention/processing speed and executive functions. In conclusion, the use of cannabis was found to be associated with improved cognitive functioning in schizophrenia.

Reference:
National Center for Biotechnology Information

A research from the University of New Hampshire has revealed that the “gateway effect” of marijuana – that teenagers who use marijuana are more likely to move on to harder illicit drugs as young adults – is overblown.

According to the research, whether teenagers who smoked pot will use other illicit drugs as young adults has more to do with life factors such as employment status and stress. In fact, the strongest predictor of whether someone would use other illicit drugs is their race/ethnicity, not whether they ever used marijuana.

The research appeared in the September 2010, issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior in the article, “A Life-course Perspective on the ‘Gateway Hypothesis’.” It was conducted by UNH associate professors of sociology Karen Van Gundy and Cesar Rebellon.

“In light of these findings, we urge U.S. drug control policymakers to consider stress and life-course approaches in their pursuit of solutions to the ‘drug problem,’ ” Van Gundy and Rebellon say.

Survey data from 1,286 young adults who attended Miami-Dade public schools in the 1990s was used by the researchers. Within the final sample, 26 percent of the respondents are African American, 44 percent are Hispanic, and 30 percent are non-Hispanic white.

It was found by the researchers that young adults who did not graduate from high school or attend college were more likely to have used marijuana as teenagers and other illicit substances in young adulthood. Moreover, those who used marijuana as teenagers and were unemployed following high school were more likely to use other illicit drugs.

“Employment in young adulthood can protect people by ‘closing’ the marijuana gateway, so over-criminalizing youth marijuana use might create more serious problems if it interferes with later employment opportunities,” Van Gundy says.
“While marijuana use may serve as a gateway to other illicit drug use in adolescence, our results indicate that the effect may be short-lived, subsiding by age 21. Interestingly, age emerges as a protective status above and beyond the other life statuses and conditions considered here. We find that respondents ‘age out’ of marijuana’s gateway effect regardless of early teen stress exposure or education, work, or family statuses,” the researchers say.

Reference:
University of New Hampshire

In the first rigorous study comparing marijuana use in the Netherlands and the United States, no evidence was found by researchers that marijuana decriminalization leads to increased drug use.

It was suggested by the results that drug policies may have less impact on marijuana use than is currently thought.
The findings appeared in an issue of the American Journal of Public Health. The study was funded by the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the Dutch Ministry of Health.

Craig Reinarman, professor of sociology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, coauthored the article, “The Limited Relevance of Drug Policy: Cannabis in Amsterdam and in San Francisco,” with Peter D. A. Cohen, director of the Centre for Drug Research (CEDRO) at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands, and Hendrien L. Kaal, now an instructor at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands.
The cannabis (marijuana and hashish) habits of users in Amsterdam and San Francisco were compared in the study for testing the premise that punishment for cannabis use deters use and thereby benefits public health.

“We compared representative samples of experienced marijuana users to see whether the lawful availability of marijuana did, in fact, lead to the problems critics of the Dutch system have claimed,” said Reinarman. “We found no evidence that it does. In fact, we found consistently strong similarities in patterns of marijuana use, despite vastly different national drug policies.”

 “In the United States, marijuana policy is based on the assertion that strict penalties are the best way to inhibit use,” said Reinarman. “The results of this study shift the burden of proof now to those who would arrest hundreds of thousands of Americans each year on the grounds that it deters use,” said Reinarman.
The study found no evidence that lawfully regulated cannabis provides a “gateway” to use of other illicit drugs.

Reference:
University of California, Santa Cruz

A recent study has revealed that legalizing marijuana use does not lead to increased use among youth. This finding was presented by a Rhode Island Hospital physician/researcher from a study investigating whether legalizing medical marijuana in Rhode Island will increase its use among youths.

Choo and her co-authors explain that the state-level legalization of medical marijuana has raised concerns about increased accessibility and appeal of the drug to youth. This study was undertaken for assessing the impact of medical marijuana legalization in Rhode Island in 2006. The involved researchers compared trends in adolescent marijuana use between Rhode Island and Massachusetts using a self-report called the Youth Risk Behavioral Surveillance System.

It was found by the researchers based on their analysis of 32,570 students that while marijuana use was common throughout the study period, there were no statistically significant differences in marijuana use between states in any year.
Choo says, “Our study did not find increases in adolescent marijuana use related to Rhode Island’s 2006 legalization of medical marijuana; however, additional research may follow future trends as medical marijuana in Rhode Island and other states becomes more widely used.”

The study was presented by lead author Esther Choo, M.D., M.P.H. at the American Public Health Association Annual Meeting and Exposition. This study was funded by a grant from the Rhode Island Foundation and researchers involved in the study with Choo include Nicholas Zaller, Ph.D., of The Miriam Hospital and Alpert Medical School, Jason Mechan, Ph.D., of Rhode Island Hospital and Alpert Medical School, Kristin Rising, M.D., of Boston Medical Center, and John McConnell, Ph.D., of Oregon Health & Science University.

Reference:
Lifespan

A new animal research has indicated that marijuana-like compounds could aid a bevy of debilitating conditions, ranging from brain disorders such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and Parkinson’s disease, to pain and obesity.

Researchers in the past have determined that the main active chemicals in the drug marijuana produce a variety of effects by connecting to specific sites on nerve cells, called cannabinoid receptors.

“Understanding how marijuana and the brain’s own natural cannabinoid system works is helping researchers design new medicines,” says cannabinoid expert Daniele Piomelli, PhD, of the University of California in Irvine. “It’s believed that the controlled therapies that come out of this research might provide select benefits to patients while avoiding some of the unwanted effects seen with the drug.”

California Pacific Medical Center research points to the promise of marijuana-like treatments for those with the fatal brain disorder ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. “Our research indicates that select marijuana compounds, including THC, significantly slow the disease process and extend the life of mice with ALS,” says study author Mary Abood, PhD. “The only FDA approved drug for ALS, riluzole, extends life on average by about two months,” says Abood. “Evidence from our study suggests that a marijuana-based therapy could create a much greater effect, perhaps extending life by three years or more.” “We found that treatment with THC delayed disease progression by seven days and extended survival by six days in the mouse model,” says Abood. “This corresponds to three years in human terms.”

It was also indicated by the results that combination of THC and cannabidiol further delays disease progression.

“For the first time, our research shows the neuroprotective value of marijuana-like compounds in a well-established animal model of Parkinson’s disease,” says study author Andrea Giuffrida, PhD, of the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. “There are therapies that can help replenish depleted levels of dopamine and provide symptomatic relief, but none can reverse, prevent, or delay the progression of Parkinson’s disease,” says Giuffrida. “Our research shows that marijuana-like compounds may be able to answer this need. “We found that the brains of mice treated with the marijuana-like compound were almost indistinguishable from the brains of healthy mice,” says Giuffrida. “We found that the combination of a marijuana-like compound with either the mild pain medication ibuprofen or rofecoxib provides more pain relief than each of them given alone,” says study author Pierre Beaulieu, MD, PhD, of the University of Montreal in Canada.

Reference:
Society for Neuroscience

Administration of cannabinoids, in the form of synthetic marijuana, blocks the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)-like symptoms in rats after they experience a traumatic event, according to a new study conducted at the University of Haifa and published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology.

“We found that there is a ‘window of opportunity’ during which administering synthetic marijuana helps deal with symptoms simulating PTSD in rats,” said Dr. Irit Akirav of the University of Haifa’s Department of Psychology, who led the study.

The researchers set out for examining how administering cannabinoids (synthetic marijuana) affects the development of PTSD-like symptoms in rats, whose physiological reactions to traumatic and stressful events is similar to human reactions. The study was conducted by Dr. Akirav with research student Eti Ganon-Elazar.

The researchers exposed a group of rats in the first part of the study to extreme stress and observed that the rats did indeed display symptoms resembling PTSD in humans, like an enhanced startle reflex, impaired extinction learning, and disruption of the negative feedback cycle of the stress-influenced HPA axis. The rats were then divided into four groups — one group was given no marijuana at all; the second was given an injection of marijuana two hours after being exposed to a traumatic event; the third group after 24 hours, and the fourth group after 48 hours.

The researchers examined the rats a week later and found that he group that had not been administered marijuana and the group that got the injection 48 hours after experiencing trauma continued to display PTSD symptoms as well as a high level of anxiety.

“This indicates that the marijuana did not erase the experience of the trauma, but that it specifically prevented the development of post-trauma symptoms in the rat model,” said Dr. Akirav, who added the results indicate there is a particular window of time during which administering marijuana is effective.

The researchers repeated stage one of experiment in second stage of the study for understanding the bran mechanism that is put into operation during the administering of marijuana. It was found that marijuana blocked development of PTSD symptoms in these cases as well, which helped in concluding that the effect of the marijuana is mediated by a CB1 receptor in the amygdala.

Reference:
Eti Ganon-Elazar, Irit Akirav. Cannabinoids Prevent the Development of Behavioral and Endocrine Alterations in a Rat Model of Intense Stress. Neuropsychopharmacology, 2011; DOI: 10.1038/npp.2011.204

According to researchers from America and Italy, boosting the amounts of a marijuana-like brain transmitter called anandamide produces antidepressant effects in test rats. The researchers led by Daniele Piomelli, the Louise Turner Arnold Chair in Neurosciences and director of the Center for Drug Discovery at the University of California, Irvine, used a drug they created (URB597) that blocks anandamide degradation in the brain, thereby increasing the levels of this chemical.

“These findings raise the hope that the mood-elevating properties of marijuana can be harnessed to treat depression,” Piomelli said. “Marijuana itself has shown no clinical use for depression. However, specific drugs that amplify the actions of natural marijuana-like transmitters in the brain are showing great promise.”

URB597 was administered by researchers to chronically-stressed rats that demonstrated behaviors similar to those seen in depressed human patients. The stressed rats treated with the drug were behaving similarly to a comparison group of unstressed animals after five weeks of treatment.

The drug works by an enzyme, FAAH, in the body that breaks down anandamide. Anandamide (dubbed “the bliss molecule” for its similarities to the active ingredient in marijuana) is a neurotransmitter that is part of the brain’s endocannabinoid system and it has been shown in studies by Piomelli and others to play analgesic, anti-anxiety, and antidepressant roles. The neurotransmitter is also involved in the regulation of feeding and obesity. Blocking FAAH activity boosts the effects of anandamide without producing the “high” seen with marijuana.

Piomelli and colleagues at the Universities of Urbino and Parma in Italy created the drug, URB597. Marco Bortolato, Regina Mangieri, Jin Fu, Janet Kim and Oliver Arguello of UC Irvine; Andrea Duranti, Andrea Tontini and Giorgio Tarzia of the University of Urbino; and Marco Mor of the University of Parma also participated in the study. It was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the University of California Discovery Program, and the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression.

The study appeared in an issue of Biological Psychiatry.

Reference:

University of California – Irvine

According to researchers at Temple University’s School of Pharmacy, the onset of pain associated with drugs used in chemotherapy could be prevented by a chemical component of the marijuana plant.

The researchers published their findings, “Cannabidiol Prevents the Development of Cold and Mechanical Allodynia in Paclitaxel-Treated Female C57Bl6 Mice,” in the journal Anesthesia and Analgesia.

The involved researchers developed animal models and tested the potency of the compound cannabidiol that is the second most abundant chemical found in the marijuana plant for relieving chemo-induced neuropathic pain, said Sara Jane Ward, research assistant professor of pharmaceutical sciences in Temple’s School of Pharmacy and the study’s lead author.

“We found that cannabidiol completely prevented the onset of the neuropathic, or nerve pain caused by the chemo drug Paclitaxel, which is used to treat breast cancer,” said Ward, who is also a research associate professor in Temple’s Center for Substance Abuse Research.

One of cannabidiol‘s major benefits is that it does not produce psycho-active effects such as euphoria, increased appetite or cognitive deficits, as per Ward. “Cannabidiol has the therapeutic qualities of marijuana but not the side effects,” she said.

“Marijuana binds to the cannabinoid receptors in the body and researchers have long been interested in whether there is therapeutic potential for targeting this receptor system,” she said.

Ward further said cannabidiol has also demonstrated the ability to decrease tumor activity in animal models that could make it an effective therapeutic for breast cancer, especially if you “combined it with a chemo agent like Paclitaxel, which we already know works well.”

The study was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Peter F. McManus Charitable Trust.

Reference:

Temple University. (2011, October 10)

According to a study published in an issue Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery, smoking marijuana (cannabis) does not increase the user’s risk of head and neck cancer. The small sample study was authored by researchers from New Zealand and Great Britain and found that the relative risk of smoking cannabis and contracting head and neck cancer in marijuana users was the same (1.0) as in those who had never smoked cannabis among 75 cases of head and neck cancer.

The results differ from the relative risk of contracting cancer from smoking cigarettes (2.1) and the heavy consumption of alcohol (5.7), compared with those who abstained from those activities. The authors cannot exclude other possible effects, and recommended a larger study because of limits of the study.

The study authors are Sarah Aldington, BMBS; Matire Harwood, MBChB; Brian Cox, PhD; Mark Weatherall, FRACP; Lutz Beckertz, MD; Anna Hansell, PhD; Alison Prithchard; Geoffrey Robinson, FRACP; and Richard Beasley, DSc. The study was conducted on behalf of the Cannabis and Respiratory Disease Research Group.

Patients with fibromyalgia treated with a synthetic form of marijuana, nabilone, showed significant reductions in pain and anxiety, according to a first-of-its-kind study, published in The Journal of Pain.

An estimated 12 million Americans have fibromyalgia and the disease syndrome has no cure and is difficult to diagnose. The disease is characterized by widespread muscle and joint pain and myriad other symptoms and the condition is far more prevalent in women and the incidence increases with age, reaching 7 percent among women 65 years and older.

Forty subjects were selected for the nabilone trial, conducted by researchers at the University of Manitoba Rehabilitation Hospital and divided into nabilone and placebo groups and were treated for four weeks. It was noted by the authors that this was the first randomized, controlled-access trial for evaluating nabilone for pain reduction and quality-of-life improvement in fibromyalgia patients. Nabilone is one of two oral marijuana-based compounds, known as cannabinoids, which is available in Canada and approved for treatment of nausea and vomiting during chemotherapy.

Nabilone has significant benefits for pain relief and functional improvement in fibromyalgia patients, the study concluded. The drug was well-tolerated by treated patients that the authors characterized as reassuring since fibromyalgia patients are sensitive to most medications and have difficulty tolerating side effects.

Reference:
American Pain Society

According to the New York Times, the New Jersey Legislature approved a measure that would make the state the 14th in the nation, but one of the few on the East Coast, to legalize the use of marijuana to help patients with chronic illnesses.

The measure – which would allow patients diagnosed with severe illnesses like cancer, AIDS, Lou Gehrig’s disease, muscular dystrophy and multiple sclerosis to have access to marijuana grown and distributed through state-monitored dispensaries – was passed by the General Assembly and State Senate on the final day of the legislative session.

The law would forbid people from growing their own marijuana, license ‘alternate treatment centers’ to dispense the drug, and require designated caretakers who retrieve the drug on behalf of a severely ill person to undergo criminal background checks.

Reference:

Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation

Scientists in Italy and the United Kingdom have reported that substances in marijuana show promise for fighting deadly drug-resistant bacterial infections, including so-called “superbugs,” without causing the drug’s mood-altering effects.

The substances, besides serving as infection-fighting drugs, could also provide a more environmentally-friendly alternative to synthetic antibacterial substances now widely used in personal care items, as per the researchers. The study appeared in an issue of ACS’ monthly Journal of Natural Products.

Giovanni Appendino and colleagues, in the study, pointed out that scientists have known for years that marijuana includes antibacterial substances but little research has been done on those ingredients, including studies on their ability to fight antibiotic resistant infections.

Researchers tested five major marijuana ingredients termed cannabinoids on different strains of a “superbug” increasingly resistant to antibiotics, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). All the five ingredients demonstrated potent germ-killing activity against these drug-resistant strains, as did some synthetic non-natural cannabinoids. It was also revealed that these substances appear to kill bacteria by different mechanisms than conventional antibiotics, making them more likely to avoid bacterial resistance.

Reference:

“Antibacterial Cannabinoids from Cannabis sativa: A Structure-Activity Study”

Giovanni Appendino, Simon Gibbons, Anna Giana, Alberto Pagani, Gianpaolo Grassi, Michael Stavri, Eileen Smith, and M. Mukhlesur Rahman

According to researchers from the University of California San Francisco, a smokeless cannabis-vaporizing device delivers the same level of active therapeutic chemical and produces the same biological effect as smoking cannabis.

Results of a UCSF study that focuses on delivery of the active ingredient delta-9-tertrahydrocannibinol, or THC, are reported in the online issue of the journal “Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics.”

“We showed in a recent paper in the journal ‘Neurology’ that smoked cannabis can alleviate the chronic pain caused by HIV-related neuropathy, but a concern was expressed that smoking cannabis was not safe. This study demonstrates an alternative method that gives patients the same effects and allows controlled dosing but without inhalation of the toxic products in smoke,” said study lead author Donald I. Abrams, MD, UCSF professor of clinical medicine.

The team of researchers looked at the effectiveness of a device that heats cannabis to a temperature between 180 and 200 degrees C, just short of combustion, which occurs at 230 degrees C. Eighteen individuals were enrolled as inpatients for six days under supervision in the General Clinical Research Center at San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center. The participants received three different strengths of cannabis on different days by two delivery methods–smoking or vaporization–three times a day, under the study protocol.

THC plasma concentrations were measured along with the exhaled levels of carbon monoxide, or CO, which served as a marker for the many other combustion-generated toxins inhaled when smoking.

“Using CO as an indicator, there was virtually no exposure to harmful combustion products using the vaporizing device. Since it replicates smoking’s efficiency at producing the desired THC effect using smaller amounts of the active ingredient as opposed to pill forms, this device has great potential for improving the therapeutic utility of THC,” said study co-author Neal L. Benowitz, MD, UCSF professor of medicine, psychiatry and biopharmaceutical sciences.

Benowitz added that pills tend to provide patients with more THC than they need for optimal therapeutic effect and increase side effects.

“By a significant majority, patients preferred vaporization to smoking, choosing the route of delivery with the fewest side effects and greatest efficiency,” said Benowitz.

Co-authors include Cheryl A. Jay, MD, UCSF neurology; and Starley B. Shade, MPH; Hector Vizoso, RN; and Mary Ellen Kelly, MPH, UCSF Positive Health Program at San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center.

The study was funded by the University of California’s Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research.

Reference:

University of California – San Francisco