Tag: CBD

The World Health Organization estimates that as many as 50 million people worldwide suffer from some level of epilepsy, from mild cases to severe. Nearly four out of every five patients diagnosed with epilepsy live in developing countries.

Epilepsy is a chronic, noncommunicable disease within the brain that affects people of all ages. Unfortunately, many cases go undiagnosed, especially cases involving child patients. Undiagnosed cases make it extremely difficult to provide proper care for the suffering patient.

Fortunately, cannabidiol (CBD) has been found to be effective at treating epilepsy. It’s likely the only form of medicine that can be cultivated and processed all over the globe via the hemp plant. Yet another study has found CBD to be effective at treating kids with epilepsy, this time out of Israel. Below is more information about it via a news release from NORML:

Tel Aviv, Israel: Children with refractory epilepsy respond favorably to long-term treatment with plant-derived CBD extracts, according to data published in Pediatric Neurology.

Israeli researchers assessed the safety and efficacy of artisanal CBD-rich extracts in a cohort of adolescents with treatment-resistant forms of epilepsy. Among patients administered extracts for a period of at least one year, 51 percent experienced a significant decline in seizure frequency. Patients reported only nominal side-effects associated with CBD treatment.

Authors concluded, “Artisanal cannabidiol-enriched cannabis may be an effective and safe long-term treatment for refractory epilepsy.”

In 2018, the US Food and Drug Administration granted market approval to Epidiolex, a prescription medicine containing a standardized formulation of plant-derived cannabidiol for the treatment of two rare forms of severe epilepsy: Lennox-Gastaut syndrome and Dravet syndrome. Shortly after approval, the US Drug Enforcement Administration reclassified Epidiolex to Schedule V of the US Controlled Substances Act — the lowest restriction classification available under federal law.

Full text of the study, “The long-term effectiveness and safety of cannabidiol-enriched oil in children with drug-resistant epilepsy,” appears in Pediatric Neurology. Additional information on cannabis and epilepsy is available from NORML.

It is estimated that roughly 4% of the world’s population suffers from some level of anxiety, although, no one really knows the actual number. The condition often goes undiagnosed for various reasons, so it’s quite possible that the rate is much higher.

Anxiety involves intense, excessive, and persistent worry and fear about everyday situations. Physical symptoms can include a fast heart rate, rapid breathing, sweating, and fatigue.

Many of the pharmaceutical medications that are commonly prescribed for anxiety involve a laundry list of terrible side effects. Some cases of anxiety are so bad that pharmaceutical treatments don’t even work.

Fortunately, CBD may be able to help in those cases. Below is more information about it via a news release from NORML:

Melbourne, Australia: The adjunctive use of CBD safely and effectively reduces severe anxiety in young people, according to clinical data published in The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.

Australian researchers assessed the daily administration of CBD in a cohort of 31 young people (ages 12 to 25) with refractory anxiety. Participants self-titrated their daily doses of CBD (between 400 mgs and 800 mgs) over a 12-week period.

CBD dosing was associated with a “statistically significant reduction in anxiety severity,” as measured on the Overall Anxiety Severity and Impairment Scale (OASIS). CBD dosing also “demonstrated an acceptable safety profile, with no serious adverse events reported and no clinically significant deviations to blood cell counts.”

Investigators reported, “Approximately 40 percent of all participants experienced a 50 percent reduction in OASIS score, and two-thirds experienced a 33 percent reduction.” They added, “By the end of treatment, the number of participants rated as markedly or severely ill had decreased from 17 (56.7 percent) to 5 (16.7 percent).”

Authors acknowledged that CBD’s greatest efficacy was observed during the final four weeks of treatment, indicating that a longer treatment regimen may potentially lead “to even greater improvements.”

They concluded: “Given that the patients included in our trial were some of the most severe and treatment resistant and had significant functional impairment and multiple failed treatment attempts, the reduction in anxiety severity observed here suggests that CBD has clinically meaningful anxiolytic effects. … The findings of this trial suggest that further investigation of CBD for anxiety in conjunction with usual care is warranted.”

Other human trials evaluating the use of CBD for anxiety have yielded inconsistent results. A 2019 placebo-controlled trial reported that daily CBD intake reduces symptoms of social anxiety disorder in teens, whereas a 2022 study determined oral doses of CBD to be ineffective at reducing symptoms of moderate-to-severe testing anxiety in college students. A 2018 Brazilian study reported that the consumption of 300mg of CBD significantly reduced anxiety due to public speaking, but that higher (600mg) and lower (150mg) had no effect.

Full text of the study, “Cannabidiol for treatment-resistant anxiety disorders in young people: An open-label trial,” appears in The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.

Having a wound in your mouth can be very uncomfortable, and in some cases, can lead to serious health issues. Developing a wound in your mouth can happen due to a number of factors, and regardless of the reason, it’s something that needs to be taken seriously.

Failing to properly care for a mouth wound can lead to infections in some cases, and at the very least, it will make the problem last longer if it goes untreated.

Researchers in Thailand recently examined the ability of cannabidiol (CBD) to treat oral inflammation, gingival wounds, and ulcers by using a scratch test assay and evaluating cytotoxicity.

“The hemp extract and CBD significantly decreased TNF-α release by up to 91.05 ± 2.91% and 50.78 ± 7.21% of LPS activity, respectively, in a dose-dependent manner, compared to 10 µg/mL hydrocortisone (61.67 ± 3.79%). The hemp extract and CBD also significantly decreased IL-1β release, also in dose-dependent response, up to 78.03 ± 3.34% and 85.87 ± 1.11% of LPS activity, respectively, compared to 5 µg/mL hydrocortisone (80.81 ± 3.55%).” the researchers stated.

“The mean percentage of closure of the wound area was 27.92 ± 1.21% when exposed to 5 µg/mL hemp extract and 33.49 ± 1.67% when exposed to 0.5 µg/mL CBD, compared to 24.34 ± 2.29% for non-treated control.” the researchers went on to say.

“Our study demonstrates that both hemp extract and CBD can inhibit TNF-α and IL-1β production in LPS-induced RAW 264.7 cells and promote wound healing in HGF-1 cells. This is the first to show that short-term exposure to hemp extract and CBD promoted gingival fibroblast wound healing, demonstrating that hemp extract and CBD have potential benefits in the treatment of oral inflammation and ulcers.” the researchers concluded.

If you are experiencing any of the conditions mentioned in this article make sure to contact a medical professional as soon as possible before trying any new treatments.

Cannabidiol (CBD) is arguably the most popular cannabinoid on the planet right now. As evidence of that, consider the fact that ‘CBD’ is Google’d more often than ‘THC’, and that has been the case for multiple years now.

Interest in CBD has spiked partially because of increased availability thanks to recent policy reforms around the globe, as well as partially because it is effectively helping suffering patients treat their conditions.

CBD is just one of the dozens of cannabinoids found within the cannabis plant. It does not cause intoxication and can be infused into a number of products.

A team of researchers in the United Kingdom and the United States recently collaborated on a study to try to determine if CBD causes physical dependency and/or withdrawal symptoms in rats.

“Cannabidiol (CBD) is a constituent of the cannabis plant with a diverse array of pharmacological activities as well as potential therapeutic uses. An oral formulation of CBD (Epidiolex^® in the US; Epidyolex^® in Europe) is approved for treating seizures associated with rare and severe forms of epilepsy. These studies, which supported the approval of the medication, investigated abuse-related effects of CBD in rats and nonhuman primates (NHPs) using drug self-administration, drug discrimination, and physical dependence procedures and characterized its pharmacokinetics.” the researchers stated in their study abstract.

“In NHPs (n=5) that self-administered midazolam (0.01 or 0.032 mg/kg/infusion), CBD (0.1-3.2 mg/kg/infusion) failed to maintain responding above vehicle levels. CBD maintained very modest levels of self-administration in rats (n=7-8) that self-administered heroin (0.015 mg/kg/infusion) and did not increase drug-lever responding, up to a dose of 150 mg/kg (p.o.), in rats (n=6) trained to discriminate 0.5 mg/kg (i.p.) midazolam. In juvenile (5-6 weeks old) and adult (10-11 weeks old) male and female rats, discontinuation of chronic treatment (twice daily for 20 days) with an oral formulation of CBD (20 or 100 mg/kg, p.o.) did not reliably produce signs of withdrawal.” the researchers went on to say.

“Pharmacokinetic studies confirmed that the dosing regimens used in these studies resulted in therapeutically relevant plasma levels. Taken together, the lack of reliable self-administration, the failure to increase drug-lever responding in rats trained to discriminate midazolam, and the absence of withdrawal signs upon discontinuation of chronic treatment indicate that CBD has very low abuse potential and is unlikely to produce physical dependence.” the researchers concluded.

Obviously, this study involved lab rats and not humans, so the results need to be kept in perspective. With that being said, with so many humans now using CBD around the globe, and no reports of dependency or withdrawal, the results of this study seem to be in line with what we are seeing among the global human population in real-time.