Cannabis sativa vs. Cannabis indica: Science or Folklore?
Golden Goat or Sour Diesel? The bland assurances from medical marijuana dispensaries about the physical and psychological effects of the bewildering array of hybrid plant strains on offer is mostly bunk, claim a growing number of cannabis scientists. Ethan Russo, a neurologist and pharmacology researcher, as well as the medical director of a biotechnology company, author of numerous books about herbal medicine, and a former faculty member at the University of Washington and the University of Montana, has something to say to marijuana connoisseurs: “There are biochemically distinct strains of Cannabis, but the sativ...
Source: Addiction Inbox - February 4, 2016 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
A Roundtable Discussion on Cannabis Use Disorder
Addressing the habit-forming aspects of marijuana.A trio of leading marijuana scientists participated in a panel discussion moderated by Dr. Daniele Piomelli from the School of Medicine at the University of California-Irvine, and published in a recent issue of the journal Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research. Dr. Margaret Haney is with the New York State Psychiatric Institute at Columbia University Medical Center; Dr. Alan J. Budney is affiliated with the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College; and Dr. Pier Vincenzo Piazza works at the Magendie Neurocenter in Bordeaux, France. Excerpts from the long discussion appear ...
Source: Addiction Inbox - January 31, 2016 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Annual NIDA Survey Shows Declines in Teen Drug Use
The kids are all right.Every year, the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA), under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health, conducts its Monitoring the Future survey of drug use among American young people in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades.This year, students got very good marks. “We are heartened to see that most illicit drug use is not increasing, non-medical use of prescription opioids is decreasing, and there is improvement in alcohol and cigarette use rates,” said Dr. Nora Volkow, Director of NIDA. Here are some highlights from this year’s study:— Despite nationwide concerns over prescription opio...
Source: Addiction Inbox - December 15, 2015 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
The Great Gateway Theory
Smoke pot, shoot smack?The Great Gateway Hypothesis has had a long, controversial run as a central tenet of American anti-drug campaigns. As put forth by Denise B. Kandell of Columbia University and others in 1975, and refined and redefined ever since, the gateway theory essentially posits that soft drugs like alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana—particularly marijuana—make users more likely to graduate to hard drugs like cocaine and heroin. What is implied is that gateway drugs cause users to move to harder drugs, by some unknown mechanism. The gateway theory forms part of the backbone of the War on Drugs. By stay...
Source: Addiction Inbox - November 21, 2015 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Freud and his Drug Demons
Cocaine addiction and psychoanalysis.That Sigmund Freud was a cocaine abuser for some portion of his professional life is by now well known. Reading An Anatomy of Addiction by Howard Markel, M.D., which chronicles the careers of Freud and another famed cocaine abuser, Johns Hopkins surgeon William Halsted, I was struck by the many ways in which even the father of modern psychotherapy could not see the delusions, evasions and outright lies that were the byproducts of his very own disease of the body and mind: drug addiction. Markel makes the case that in several important ways Freud’s cocaine addiction was hopelessly enta...
Source: Addiction Inbox - October 30, 2015 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Cannabis Receptors and the Runner’s High
[First published August 4 2010]Maybe it isn't endorphins after all.What do long-distance running and marijuana smoking have in common? Quite possibly, more than you’d think. A growing body of research suggests that the runner’s high and the cannabis high are more similar than previously imagined. The nature of the runner’s high is inconsistent and ephemeral, involving several key neurotransmitters and hormones, and therefore difficult to measure. Much of the evidence comes in the form of animal models. Endocannabinoids—the body’s internal cannabis—“seem to contribute to the motivational aspects of volu...
Source: Addiction Inbox - October 11, 2015 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
The Zendo Project
(Source: Addiction Inbox)
Source: Addiction Inbox - October 8, 2015 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Alcohol and Your Heart
Health benefits of moderate drinking come under fire.One of those things that “everybody knows” about alcohol is that a drink or two per day is good for your heart. But maybe not as good for your heart as no drinks at all.Joint first authors Michael V. Holmes of the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at University College in London, and Caroline E. Dale at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine in London, recently published a multi-site meta-analysis of epidemiological studies centering on a common gene for alcohol metabolization. The report, published in the UK journal BMJ, brings “the hypoth...
Source: Addiction Inbox - August 25, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
The Chemistry of Modern Marijuana
Is low-grade pot better for you than sinsemilla?First published September 3, 2013.Australia has one of the highest rates of marijuana use in the world, but until recently, nobody could say for certain what, exactly, Australians were smoking. Researchers at the University of Sydney and the University of New South Wales analyzed hundreds of cannabis samples seized by Australian police, and put together comprehensive data on street-level marijuana potency across the country. They sampled police seizures and plants from crop eradication operations. The mean THC content of the samples was 14.88%, while absolute levels var...
Source: Addiction Inbox - August 20, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Synthetic Cannabis Can Cause Cyclic Vomiting
Another reason to skip "Spice."Cannabinoid hyperemesis, as it is known, was not documented in the medical literature until 2004. Case studies of more than 100 patients have been reported since then. The biomedical researcher who blogs as Drugmonkey has documented cases of hyperemesis that had been reported in Australia and New Zealand, as well as Omaha and Boston in the U.S.As Drugmonkey reported, patients who are heavy marijuana smokers, and who experience cyclic nausea and vomiting, “discovered on their own that taking a hot bath or shower alleviated their symptoms. So afflicted individuals were taking multiple h...
Source: Addiction Inbox - August 12, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Avoid the ‘Noid: Synthetic Cannabinoids and “Spiceophrenia”
Like PCP all over again.Synthetic cannabis-like “Spice” drugs were first introduced in early 2004, and quickly created a global marketplace. But the drugs responsible for the psychoactive effects of Spice products weren’t widely characterized until late 2008. And only recently have researchers made significant progress toward understanding why these drugs cause so many problems, compared to organic marijuana.Synthetic cannabinoids (SC), as a class of drugs, are generally more potent at cannabinoid receptors than marijuana itself. As full agonists, synthetic cannabinoids show binding affinities between 5 and 10,...
Source: Addiction Inbox - July 31, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Getting Spiced
Synthetic cannabis is stronger than it used to be.First published 10/07/2013 I wish I could stop writing blog posts about Spice, as the family of synthetic cannabinoids has become known. I wish young people would stop taking these drugs, and stick to genuine marijuana, which is far safer. I wish that politicians and proponents of the Drug War would lean in a bit and help, by knocking off the testing for marijuana in most circumstances, so the difficulty of detecting Spice products isn’t a significant factor in their favor. I wish synthetic cannabinoids weren’t research chemicals, untested for safety in humans, so that ...
Source: Addiction Inbox - July 26, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Hunting For the Marijuana-Dopamine Connection
Why do heavy pot smokers show a blunted reaction to stimulants?Most drugs of abuse increase dopamine transmission in the brain, and indeed, this is thought to be the basic neural mechanism underlying the rewarding effects of addictive drugs. But in the case of marijuana, the dopamine connection is not so clear-cut. Evidence has been found both for and against the notion of increases in dopamine signaling during marijuana intoxication. Marijuana has always been the odd duck in the pond, research-wise. Partly this is due to longstanding federal intransigence toward cannabis research, and partly it is because cannabis, chemic...
Source: Addiction Inbox - July 21, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Drugs and Disease: A Look Forward
First published 2/18/2014. Former National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) director Alan Leshner has been vilified by many for referring to addiction as a chronic, relapsing “brain disease.” What often goes unmentioned is Leshner’s far more interesting characterization of addiction as the “quintessential biobehavioral disorder.”Multifactorial illnesses present special challenges to our way of thinking about disease. Addiction and other biopsychosocial disorders often show symptoms at odds with disease, as people generally understand it. For patients and medical professionals alike, questions about the disease aspe...
Source: Addiction Inbox - July 20, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
Vitamin C and Pregnant Women Who Smoke
Improving pulmonary function in newborns. 500 mg of daily vitamin C given to pregnant smoking women “decreased the effects of in-utero nicotine” and “improved measures of pulmonary function” in their newborns, according to a study by Cindy T. McEvoy and others at the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, published in a recent issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Researchers have long known that smoking during pregnancy can harm the respiratory health of newborns. Maternal smoking during pregnancy can interfere with normal lung development, resulting in lifelong increase...
Source: Addiction Inbox - June 28, 2014 Category: Addiction Authors: Dirk Hanson Source Type: blogs
