Tag Archives: marijuana

Cannabinoids promote embryonic and adult hippocampus neurogenesis and produce anxiolytic- and antidepressant-like effects.

Posted on by
Reply

115-11-cover

“Cannabis (marijuana, hashish, or cannabinoids) has been used for medical and recreational purposes for many centuries and is likely the only medicine or illicit drug that has constantly evoked tremendous interest or controversy within both the public domain and medical research. Cannabinoids appear to be able to modulate pain, nausea, vomiting, epilepsy, ischemic stroke, cerebral trauma, multiple sclerosis, tumors, and other disorders in humans and/or animals.

Cannabis acts on 2 types of cannabinoid receptors, the CB1 and CB2 receptors, which are distributed mainly in the brain and immune system, respectively. In the brain, CB1 receptors are also targeted by endogenous cannabinoids (i.e., endocannabinoids) such as anandamide (AEA), 2-arachidonylglycerol, and arachidonylethanolamide…

…since adult hippocampal neurogenesis is suppressed following chronic administration of opiates, alcohol, nicotine, and cocaine, the present study suggests that cannabinoids are the only illicit drug that can promote adult hippocampal neurogenesis following chronic administration…

Cannabinoids promote embryonic and adult hippocampus neurogenesis and produce anxiolytic- and antidepressant-like effects.”  

https://www.jci.org/articles/view/25509

“University Of Saskatchewan Research Suggests Marijuana Analogue Stimulates Brain Cell Growth”  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/10/051016083817.htm

The efficacy and safety of nabilone (a synthetic cannabinoid) in the treatment of anxiety.

Posted on by
Reply

“The anxiolytic properties of nabilone, a synthetic cannabinoid resembling the natural cannabinoids, were studied in 25 outpatients suffering from anxiety. The drug was compared with a placebo in a double-blind manner over a 28-day treatment period. Patients were seen weekly by the physician and were rated by the Hamilton Rating Scale for Anxiety and the Patient’s Global Evaluation as well as by patient-rated evaluations. The results of the study showed a dramatic improvement in anxiety in the nabilone group when compared with placebo (P less than 0.001). Side effects reported were dry mouth, dry eyes, and drowsiness. Patients did not report any of the subjective “altered state” experience of marihuana.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6117575

Inhibition of endocannabinoid catabolic enzymes elicits anxiolytic-like effects in the marble burying assay

Posted on by
Reply

“Cannabinoids have long been shown to have a range of potential therapeutic effects, including antiemetic actions, analgesia, and anxiolysis. These data indicate that elevation of AEA or 2-AG reduces marble burying behavior and suggest that their catabolic enzymes represent potential targets for the development of new classes of pharmacotherapeutics to treat anxiety-related disorders.

Marijuana is commonly smoked to reduce feelings of stress and anxiety… much interest has been generated by the discovery of the endogenous cannabinoid (i.e. endocannabinoid; eCB) system as a source of targets for the development of new therapeutic treatments of a range of ailments including anxiety and depression…”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3034086/

Pot Stirring – ELLE

Posted on by
Reply

“Some are using marijuana as their drug of choice to curb anxiety.”

Marijuana Anxiety Disorders
 

 “A thimbleful is all it takes. After a day’s work, I pinch off a small amount of marijuana and put it in a steel-tooth grinder. The flowers, covered in tiny white diamonds of THC, release a piney scent when crushed. I turn on the TV, and instead of taking a glass of wine with my evening news, I take out my vaporizer and set it on the coffee table.

Outside the walls of my bungalow in Oakland, California, I can hear the rush-hour traffic, but I’ve already changed into my Big Lebowski–style robe and slippers. I tap the ground flakes into a canister that I attach to another piece, this one with a bag on the end, and set both on the vaporizer. I flip the switch, and the bag slowly inflates with plumes of white smoke. Once it’s fully clouded, I attach a mouthpiece to the canister, put this to my lips, and press. On the inhale, the cannabinoids taste like sunned grass. My prescription for anxiety disorder didn’t always begin and end with an herb. But I’ve run through enough pharmaceutical drugs to know that pot dulls my panic better than any pill.”

Read more; http://www.elle.com/beauty/health-fitness/pot-stirring-19727

Marijuana nutrients found to help prevent Alzheimer’s disease

Posted on by
Reply
“A study conducted by scientists at Scripps Research Institute in California has found that, contrary to marijuana’s reputation, the ingredients of the drug can actually fight off the memory-impairing effects of Alzheimer’s disease.The researchers found that the active ingredient in marijuana — delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC — is responsible for the positive effect, as it can prevent the breakdown of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine even better than commercially marketed prescription drugs.

The study also showed that THC could completely prevent the enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AchE) from forming amyloid plaques, whereas twice as much donepezil and tacrine — the two drugs approved for Alzheimer’s treatment — only reduced such clumping by 22 and 7 percent, respectively, the researchers reported in the journal Molecular Pharmaceutics. This led the scientists to conclude that a more effective Alzheimer’s drug could be developed in the future.”

Read more: http://www.naturalnews.com/020667_Marijuana_Alzheimers_drugs.htm

Medical Marijuana as Effective Treatment for Alzheimer’s Disease

Posted on by
Reply

“Regular low dose cannabis smoking might keep Alzheimer’s away, according to marijuana research by professor Gary Wenk and associate professor Yannic Marchalant of the Ohio State Department of Psychology. Wenk’s studies show that a low dosage in the morning of a certain cannabinoid, a component in marijuana, reversed memory loss in older rats’ brains. In his study, an experimental group of old rats received a dosage, and a control group of rats did not. The old rats that received the drugs performed better on memory tests, and the drug slowed and prevented brain cell death.”

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

“Alzheimer’s is a disease unique to humans…, but rat brains are similar enough to human brains to serve as partial models for humans, Wenk said.

… marijuana is the first substance that has worked on older brains in experiments.”

 

Read more: http://alzheimers-review.blogspot.com/2009/11/medical-marijuana-as-effective.html

 

Alzheimer’s: Marijuana as Effective Medicine

Posted on by
Reply

“Cannabis is getting much positive publicity and seems to be regaining its popularity of one hundred years ago when it was the most widely used drug for about 100 different diseases. There is a big toodoo nowadays about Alzheimers which has turned into almost an epidemic for old folks with some even in their 50’s. So far nobody seems to have put a handle on it and I won’t either.The latest information seems to be that there are senile plaques in the cerebral cortex and subcortical grey matter but whether these plaques are a cause or effect seems to be up for grabs.

I don’t know either. My Merck manual says that four million Americans have it, mostly those over 60 years old. It is a very expensive disease for nursing homes and nursing care probably at least 100 billion dollars per year.

As a Medical Marijuana doctor, I jumped into this fracas when I heard that a lady spouse of an Alzheimers patient went to a Medical Marijuana Advisory Committee meeting of The Oregon Medical Marijuana Program (OMMP) and demanded that her husband be given a permit. She was successful and the medical statistics from OMMP indicate that somewhat less than 50 people have Marijuana permits for this disease. It is called Alzheimers Rage.

The above really didn’t surprise me because there are several Central Nervous System (CNS) diseases for which Cannabis/Marijuana (C/MJ) works very well. These include ALS, Epilepsy, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinsonism, PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBIs). I don’t know if anyone has figured out why C/MJ works for these conditions but why ask if those suffering say that C/MJ works.

Tod Mikiyuria, the foremost scholar in this area, says that C/MJ works as a modulator which is a term of general meaning which possibly just means that it works.

The standard drugs are almost worthless, many seem to be Cholinergics related to Acetyl Choline, the standard Neuro transmitter nerve cell to cell and nerve cell to muscle. At any rate C/MJ seems to work better than any of the heavily advertised drugs.

Cannabis/Marijuana is simultaneously getting much positive publicity and seems to be regaining its popularity of one hundred years ago when it was the most widely used drug for about 100 different diseases.

Those of us advocates for Medical Marijuana who have suffered scorn and derision for DEVIL WEED causing REEFER MADNESS can finally say

WE TOLD YOU SO!!!” –
 
Dr. Phil Leveque 
 

Marijuana and Alzheimer’s – How Marijuana Outperforms Drugs for Alzheimer’s Disease

Posted on by
Reply

“Marijuana and Alzheimer’s – Alzheimer’s Help without Nasty Drug-Induced Side Effects.”

marijuanaplants 235x147 Marijuana and Alzheimers How Marijuana Outperforms Drugs for Alzheimer’s Disease

“The war on drugs has most people believing there is no legitimate argument for marijuana, causing it to be highly looked down upon and illegal under federal law throughout the United States. But there is an exceptionally large body of research pointing to the positive impact marijuana can have on various health ailments, with recent research revealing a link between marijuana and Alzheimer’s – showing that THC, the psychoactive component of marijuana, may be beneficial for Alzheimer’s patients.

As published in the journal Molecular Pharmacology, a Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology study shows that Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) both “competitively inhibits the enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AChE) as well as prevents AChE-induced amyloid β-peptide (Aβ) aggregation.” In other words, cannabinoid molecules found in cannabis could halt the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.”

Read more by  : http://naturalsociety.com/marijuana-and-alzheimers-outperforms-harmful-drugs/

“A Molecular Link Between the Active Component of Marijuana and Alzheimer’s Disease Pathology” – Free full text: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2562334/

Cannabidiol affects the expression of genes involved in zinc homeostasis in BV-2 microglial cells.

Posted on by
Reply

“Cannabidiol (CBD) has been shown to exhibit anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and neuroprotective properties. Unlike Δ(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), CBD is devoid of psychotropic effects and has very low affinity for both cannabinoid receptors, CB(1) and CB(2). We have previously reported that CBD and THC have different effects on anti-inflammatory pathways in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated BV-2 microglial cells, in a CB(1)/CB(2) independent manner. Moreover, CBD treatment of BV-2 cells, was found to induce a robust change in the expression of genes related to oxidative stress, glutathione deprivation and inflammation. Many of these genes were shown to be controlled by Nrf2 and ATF4 transcription factors. Using the Illumina MouseRef-8 BeadChip platform, DAVID Bioinformatics and Ingenuity Pathway Analysis, we identified functional sets of genes and networks affected by CBD. A subset of genes was found to be regulated by the metal responsive element (MRE)-binding transcription factor-1 (MTF-1) and is shown to be related to zinc homeostasis. We found that CBD upregulates the expression of the mRNAs for metallothionein 2 (Mt2), N-myc-downstream regulated gene 1 and matrix metalloproteinase 23 as well as of the zinc transporters ZnT1/Slc30a1 and Zip4/Slc39a4 but downregulates the expression of the mRNA for the zinc transporter Zip10/Slc39a10 as well as for the zinc finger protein 472. Among these genes, ZnT1, Mt2 and the zinc transporters ZIPs are known to function together to control the intracellular zinc concentration. These results show that CBD, but much less so THC, affects the expression of genes involved in zinc homeostasis and suggest that the regulation of zinc levels could have an important role through which CBD may exert its antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22178458

Cannabidiol as an Emergent Therapeutic Strategy for Lessening the Impact of Inflammation on Oxidative Stress

Posted on by
Reply

Figure 1

“Growing evidence suggests that the endocannabinoid system, which includes the CB1 and CB2 G protein-coupled receptors and their endogenous lipid ligands, may be an area that is ripe for therapeutic exploitation. In this context, the related nonpsychotropic cannabinoid cannabidiol, which may interact with the endocannabinoid system, but has actions that are distinct, offers promise as a prototype for anti-inflammatory drug development.

This review discusses recent studies suggesting that cannabidiol may have utility in treating a number of human diseases and disorders now known to involve activation of the immune system and associated oxidative stress, as a contributor to their etiology and progression. These include rheumatoid arthritis, types I and II diabetes, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, hypertension, the metabolic syndrome, ischemia-reperfusion injury, depression, and neuropathic pain.

Cannabidiol (CBD) is the major nonpsychotropic cannabinoid compound derived from the plant Cannabis sativa, commonly known as marijuana…

Conclusions

Inflammation and oxidative stress are intimately involved in the genesis of many human diseases. Unraveling that relationship therapeutically has proven challenging, in part because inflammation and oxidative stress “feed off” each other. However, CBD would seem to be a promising starting point for further drug development given its anti-oxidant (although relatively modest) and anti-inflammatory actions on immune cells, such as macrophages and microglia. CBD also has the advantage of not having psychotropic side effects. Studies on models of human diseases support the idea that CBD attenuates inflammation far beyond its antioxidant properties, for example, by targeting inflammation-related intracellular signaling events. The details on how CBD targets inflammatory signaling remain to be defined.

The therapeutic utility of CBD is a relatively new area of investigation that portends new discoveries on the interplay between inflammation and oxidative stress, a relationship that underlies tissue and organ damage in many human diseases.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3085542/