Cannabidiol: Treatment for Psychosis?
People suffering from Parkinson’s disease have a high rate of psychosis, which may be induced or worsened by drugs used to treat the illness. A recently published study in the Journal of Psychopharmacology suggests that a marijuana component called cannabidiol (CBD) may be a helpful treatment for this condition.
This was a small, uncontrolled pilot study, but CBD produced rapid and fairly dramatic reductions in psychotic symptoms. And the growing body of evidence regarding CBD’s anti-psychotic properties has important implications beyond Parkinson’s patients. For example, there is some evidence that THC can worsen psychotic symptoms, but at least one study has implied that CBD, if present in sufficient quantities, can counter this effect.
Tagged with: cannabinoids and science and THC by the author
6 comments
Interesting. But here’s the catch. THC is legally available as Marinol (generic is dronabinol). However, cannabidiol — although not considered psychoactive — is technically illegal in its pure form and is definitely illegal in its natural form as found in cannabis.
Is our legal system stupid? Oh yeah.
Marinol is the Pharmnaceuticals industry attempt to make massive amounts of money off a synthetic version of medicinal THC . It costs about $1,000.00/mo. The FDA approved it, which means that marijuana does have medicinal use. But, the real point is that THC needs CBD to balance it in order for it’s medicinal value to be most efficaciously used. Meaning that cannabis should be used in it’s natuaral form for many illnesses. It seems that GOD knows what’s best when it comes to how to use his medicine. Cannabis extracts of up to 40% concentration where used in 50% of all American medicines prior to being prohibited. They effectively treated over 100 illnesses. There were few incidents, no addictions and no deaths ever reported. These extracts are far more potent than anything ever smoked. So, the dangers of cannabis potency are a red herring. Smoking cannabis is probably not the best way to use cannabis. Vaporization is safer by far. Perhaps, Obama could open the door to cannabis use if he would lift the NIDA/DEA/FDA ban on testing cannabis for it’s medicinal uses. Unfortunately, every sign he is giving seems to be pointing in the opposite direction. Please, contact Obama’s transition team and vote for the legalization of marijuana.
“Please, contact Obama’s transition team and vote for the legalization of marijuana.”
How does one go about doing that?
The transition team has done two separate surveys on change.gov in which people were asked to post questions and then vote on which ones they wanted to see answered by the President-elect and his team. I think the second such round was just ended, but watch the site — there may be more. There are other places on change.gov where people can send personal stories, etc., to the transition team, such as http://change.gov/page/s/yourstory
Keeps me from going nuts at times
I’m diagnosed with major depression and psychotic features. Along with my depressed symptoms, I also hear voices. I take pharmaceuticals for both issues, but have been unable to eliminate the depression. For 2 months now marijuana has been improving my mood, without exciting my psychosis. Schizophrenics probably shouldn’t smoke marijuana, however. Psychiatrists have a field day with their schizophrenic patients who smoke pot. Also, children who smoke a lot of pot at a young age, during much of their mental development, are more likely to develop schizophrenia. There’s more information at my website.
Leave a Comment