Marijuana and Strokes: Medical Reality or Scare Story?

Heavy tokers may be at higher risk, but alcohol is the hidden confounder. Young people don’t suffer from strokes, as a rule. And when they do, at least half the time there is no obvious cardiovascular explanation. So it’s not surprising that drugs are often invoked as the culprit. A New Zealand study earlier this year once again raised the specter of a possible link between stroke and marijuana smoking. As reported by Maia Szalavitz at Time Healthland, the confounding issue, as is typical of such studies, is the coexisting use of other drugs, like alcohol and cigarettes. As Szalavitz writes: The stroke study, which incorporated preliminary data, is the first trial of its kind to study a possible connection between marijuana use and stroke. It included 160 patients aged 18 to 55 who had suffered a stroke connected to a blood clot in the brain, and who agreed to have their urine tested for marijuana within 72 hours of the stroke.  These results were compared to those from 160 controls who had not had a stroke but came to the hospital for other reasons. They were matched on age, gender and ethnic background, all of which can also affect the risk for this type of stroke. About 16% of the stroke patients showed traces of marijuana in their urine, compared to 8% of those in the control group, suggesting a doubling of the risk of stroke. However, because of nicotine and other confounding variables, that study was considered inconclusive. In an earlier study published...
Source: Addiction Inbox - Category: Addiction Authors: Source Type: blogs