The Latest Buzz on Marijuana

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One of the problems when it comes to the debate of marijuana is that there is a surprisingly a limited amount of research conducted on the effects and long term use of the drug. The Controlled Substances Act of 1970 branded Schedule I, deeming it a drug with no medicinal value and high potential for abuse. To do clinical research with marijuana, you need a DEA license, as well as having your study approved by the FDA. Then you have to go through strict guidelines to obtain the marijuana. The National Institute on Drug abuse oversees this process. Many researchers who have focused their studies on the potential medical benefits of marijuana, find this to be problematic.

Currently, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is studying the medical evidence surrounding the safety and effectiveness of marijuana. The process could lead to the FDA downgrading the Marijuana’s current status as a Schedule I drug. Rescheduling marijuana would not make it legal, but a lower schedule could possibly ease restrictions on research.

The FDA uses an eight-factor analysis to access to determine a drug classification. Here are those 8 factors:

Its actual or relative potential for abuse
Scientific evidence of its pharmacological effect, if known
The state of current scientific knowledge regarding the drug or other substance
Its history and current pattern of abuse
The scope, duration, and significance of abuse
What, if any, risk there is to the public health
Its psychic or physiological dependence liability

Whether the substance is an immediate precursor of a substance already controlled under this subchapter

Whether you are a proponent of either medical use or recreational use, the one constant factor is side effects. There has been some very promising research on medical marijuana usage with conditions such as:

AIDS wasting syndrome
Neuropathic pain
Cancer
Multiple sclerosis
Chemotherapy-induced nausea
Certain seizure disorders

Glaucoma

More long term studies are needed to show efficacy as well as an understanding the role the drug plays in treatment. An important fact to remember is that, the benefits have to clearly outweigh the negatives. This is a factor in any drug that is considered for medical purposes. Recreational users often cite that people have different reactions to marijuana. That is true of any drug. All you have do is look on the warning label of any over the counter cold medication. Some people will get “sleepy” and some will get “agitated,” but in either case, it should help with your cold symptoms. The consumer has to evaluate the benefit based on their reaction to the product. The big difference is that the consumer is protected by a regulating body and there is an understanding that a product does not reach the shelf unless its safety has been deemed safe. The same type of oversight is not present in the marijuana industry. States that have legalized marijuana have worked hard to regulate and set standards but there is not a national protocol such as the FDA provides to consumers. Sellers of designer drugs and synthetic marijuana go to great lengths to avoid FDA oversight by misrepresenting the product such as “Bath Salts” and that it should not be ingested. Yet, it is fairly common knowledge among adolescents and young adults that it is a drug that is consumed.

Earlier this year, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) issued a statement opposing medical marijuana outside of the usual process by the FDA to approve pharmaceutical products. One of the main concerns with medical marijuana was that it is not standardized, so the term really applies to any part of the Cannabis. Other recommendations by the APP:

Research and development should be conducted of pharmaceutical cannabinoids. The AAP recommends changing marijuana from a DEA Schedule 1 to a DEA Schedule 2 to facilitate this research.
The federal and state governments should establish robust health surveillance regarding the impact of marijuana, particularly on children and adolescents.
In states that have legalized marijuana for recreational use, the AAP strongly recommends strict enforcement of rules and regulations that limit access, marketing and advertising to youth.
Where marijuana is sold legally, either for medicinal or recreational purposes, it should be contained in child-proof packaging to prevent accidental ingestion.

The AAP discourages adults from using marijuana in the presence of children because of the influence of role modeling by adults on child and adolescent behavior.

The Academy also recommends that marijuana be decriminalized, so that penalties for marijuana-related offenses are reduced to lesser criminal charges or civil penalties. Efforts to decriminalize marijuana should take place in conjunction with efforts to prevent marijuana use and promote early treatment of adolescents with marijuana use problems.

The AAP also recommends that marijuana be decriminalized, so that penalties for marijuana-related offenses are reduced to lesser criminal charges or civil penalties. Efforts to decriminalize marijuana should take place in conjunction with efforts to prevent marijuana use and promote early treatment of adolescents with marijuana use problems

The belief that marijuana may have therapeutic effects, has sound reasoning in science, but the process is not fully understood. In the late 90’s scientist’s discovered that the body had a complex neural structure known as the endocannabinoid (EC) system. The human brain contains approximately 100 billion neurons. Neurons communicate with each other and with the rest of the body through chemical messages known as neurotransmitters. This system allow the brain to communicate with the body what it wants to do. There is a small gap between neurons known as a synapse. A neurotransmitter will cause a chemical reaction that allow the neural signal to jump this gap (pre-synaptic) and then attach to specific receptors located on a nearby neuron (postsynaptic.) This in turn activates the receiving neuron into action, triggering a set of events that allows the message to be passed along. These messages help coordinate and regulate everything we feel, think, and do

Individual cannabinoid systems are involved with performing different tasks but their overall goal is the maintenance of a stable internal environment independent of the external environment. The EC system communicates its messages in a different way. It operates in reverse. When the postsynaptic neuron is activated, cannabinoids are made fat cells already present in the neuron. Then they are released from that cell they travel backward to the presynaptic neuron, where they attach to cannabinoid receptors. Since cannabinoids focus on presynaptic cells, they can control what happens next when these cells are activated. In general, cannabinoids function as an inhibitor (neurotransmitters are either excitatory or inhibitory) for presynaptic neurons. This affects how messages are sent, received, and processed by the cell.

When THC enters the body, it interacts with receptors to regulate that regulate certain body functions. THC attaches to neurons, with specific kinds of cannabinoid receptors. Normally, these receptors are activated by chemicals that occur naturally in the body. Since cannabinoids act on presynaptic cells, they can control what happens next when these cells are activated. In general, cannabinoids function like a “dimmer switch” for presynaptic neurons, limiting the amount of neurotransmitter (e.g., dopamine) that gets released, which in turn affects how messages are sent, received, and processed by the cell. The Cannabinoid System is involved with performing different tasks, their goal over all goal is to maintenance of a stable internal environment

Endocannabinoids and their receptors are found throughout the body, in the brain, organs, connective tissues, glands, and immune cells. The cannabinoid system performs different tasks, but the overall goal is always the same, maintaining a stable internal environment despite fluctuations in the external environment.

Smoking marijuana, allows the THC in marijuana, the ability to overwhelm the EC system, by quickly by attaching to cannabinoid receptors throughout the brain and body. This interferes with the ability of natural cannabinoids to do their job, which can throw the entire system off balance, which counter acts the goal of the EC system, to maintain a stable internal environment, independent of the external environment. Most of the cannabinoid receptors are found in parts of the brain that influence pleasure, memory, thinking, concentration, sensory and time perception, and coordinated movement. When the system is disrupted by THC it can lead to problems in several areas

Judgment - THC affects areas of the frontal cortex involved in decision making. This creates a distinctive set of circumstances for adolescents and young adults since by some estimates, the frontal lobe is not fully developed until age 25. Using marijuana can impair decision making causing the users to make decisions they might not otherwise if they were not “high.” Whether it can cause permanent damage in the prefrontal cortex is still open to debate.
Learning and Memory - The hippocampus plays a critical role in certain types of learning. By disrupting normal functioning it can lead to a break down in learning. The leaning process generally involves 3 processes, intake, storage and retrieval. This is expressed directly with problems studying, learning new things, and recalling recent events. For users who say marijuana helps them study, rather than challenge you we like to point out that this exposes you to a phenomenon known as “state dependent learning.” This essentially means if you study “high” then to be most effective you would have to take the test “high.”

Coordination - THC affects the cerebellum, the area of our brain that controls balance and coordination and the basal ganglia, another part of the brain that helps control movement. These effects can influence performance in such activities as sports, driving, and video games.

Since the discovery of the EC system, there has been an estimated twenty-one thousand scientific articles that are just beginning to understand the complexities involved on the subject. The medical and legal marijuana debate have clearly brought to light that there is much to do yet.