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Brain Imaging Study Links Cannabinoid Receptors to PTSD Treatment

May 15th

medical marijuana joint

NEW YORK, NY — In a first-of-its-kind effort to illuminate the biochemical impact of trauma, researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center have discovered a connection between the quantity of cannabinoid receptors in the human brain, known as CB1 receptors, and post-traumatic stress disorder, the chronic, disabling condition that can plague trauma victims with flashbacks, nightmares and emotional instability. Their findings, which appear online today in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, will also be presented this week at the annual meeting of the Society of Biological Psychiatry in San Francisco.

CB1 receptors are part of the endocannabinoid system, a diffuse network of chemicals and signaling pathways in the body that plays a role in memory formation, appetite, pain tolerance and mood. Animal studies have shown that psychoactive chemicals such as cannabis, along with certain neurotransmitters produced naturally in the body, can impair memory and reduce anxiety when they activate CB1 receptors in the brain.

Lead author Alexander Neumeister, MD, director of the molecular imaging program in the Departments of Psychiatry and Radiology at NYU School of Medicine, and colleagues are the first to demonstrate through brain imaging that people with PTSD have. . . . . READ MORE

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Study: Inhaled Cannabis Reduces Crohn’s Disease Symptoms

May 15th

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Inhaling cannabis reduces symptoms of Crohn’s disease compared to placebo in patients non-responsive to traditional therapies, according to clinical trial data published online ahead of print in the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology.

Researchers at the Meir Medical Center, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in Israel assessed the safety and efficacy of inhaled cannabis versus placebo in 21 subjects with Crohn’s disease who were nonresponsive to conventional treatments.

Eleven participants smoked standardized cannabis cigarettes containing 23 percent THC and 0.5 percent CBD (cannabidiol) twice daily over a period of eight weeks. The other ten subjects smoked placebo cigarettes containing no active cannabinoids.

Investigators reported, “Our data show that 8-weeks treatment with THC-rich cannabis, but not placebo, was associated with a significant decrease of 100 points in CDAI (Crohn’s Disease and activity index) scores.” (The CDIA is a research tool used to quantify the symptoms of Crohn’s disease patients.) Five of the eleven patients in the study group also reported achieving disease remission (defined as a reduction in pat. . . . . READ MORE

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Study: Marijuana Use Could Reduce Risk of Bladder Cancer

May 12th

smoking a joint

LOS ANGELES, CA — New research says smoking marijuana may be less likely to cause bladder cancer than smoking cigarettes.

For the study, the researchers compared the risk of bladder cancer in more than 83,000 men who smoked cigarettes only, marijuana (cannabis) only, or both substances. The investigators found that men who only smoked pot were the least likely to develop bladder cancer over the course of 11 years.

“Cannabis use only was associated with a 45 percent reduction in bladder cancer incidence, and tobacco use only was associated with a 52 percent increase in bladder cancer,” said study author Dr. Anil A. Thomas, a fellow in urology at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Los Angeles.

Smoking both tobacco and marijuana raised the risk of bladder cancer, but less so than for those who only smoked tobacco, Thomas found. He presented the findings Monday at the American Urological Association annual meeting in San Diego.

Dr. Karim Chamie, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, took issue with the fact that every man in the study smoked something, so there was no comparison to men who did not smoke at all.

“It’s hard to judge a study when the referenc. . . . . READ MORE

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Study: No Association Between Cannabis Smoke and Risk of Lung Cancer

May 11th

lighting a joint bw

LOS ANGELES, CA — In a recent presentation given at the annual meeting of the American Association of Cancer Research, investigators from the University of California, Los Angeles provided the latest data reaffirming that cannabis consumption is not associated with an elevated risk of lung cancer.

Below is a summary of the findings from The Oncology Report:

The study included data from six case-control studies conducted from 1999 to 2012 in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand, with a subject pool of 2,159 lung cancer cases and 2,985 controls. All of the studies were part of the International Lung Cancer Consortium (ILCCO), an international group of lung cancer researchers with the aim of sharing comparable data from ongoing and recently completed lung cancer studies from different geographical areas and ethnicities.

Dr. Zhang of the University of California, Los Angeles, performed two analyses. One compared all lung cancer cases and all controls, regardless of concurrent or past tobacco use. Then, to reduce confounding by tobacco,. . . . . READ MORE

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Study: Cannabinoid Agonists Mitigate HIV Infection

May 8th

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PHILADELPHIA, PA — The administration of synthetic cannabinoid agonists limits HIV infection in macrophages (white blood cells that aid in the body’s immune response), according to preclinical data published in the Journal of Leukocyte Biology. Macrophages are one of the first type of cells infected by the HIV virus when it enters the body.

Investigators at Temple University School of Medicine in Philadelphia assessed the impact of three commercially available synthetic THC agonists on HIV-infected macrophage cells.

Following administration, researchers sampled the cells periodically to measure the activity of an enzyme called reverse transcriptase (RT), which is essential for HIV replication. By day 7, investigators reported that the administration of all three compounds was associated with a significant decreased in HIV replication.

Stated a Temple University Health System press release: “The results suggest that selective CB2 (cannabinoid 2 receptor) agonists could potentially be used in tandem with existing antiretroviral drugs,. . . . . READ MORE

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