“Despite the widespread use of polypharmacy, the management of hepatitis C virus (HCV) treatment-related side-effects is often incomplete, and many patients turn to cannabis for symptom relief.
Our results suggest that modest cannabis use may offer symptomatic and virological benefit to some patients undergoing HCV treatment by helping them maintain adherence to the challenging medication regimen.”
“Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) including ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease are chronic relapsing and remitting chronic diseases for which there is no cure.
The treatment of IBD frequently requires immunosuppressive and biologic therapies which carry an increased risk of infections and possible malignancy.
There is a continued search for safer and more natural therapies in the treatment of IBD.
This review aims to summarize the most current literature on the use of dietary supplements for the treatment of IBD. Specifically, the efficacy and adverse effects of vitamin D, fish oil, probiotics, prebiotics, curcumin, Boswellia serrata, aloe vera and cannabis sativa are reviewed.”
“The observation that marijuana reduces intraocular pressure was made by Hepler and Frank in the 1970s. Since then, there has been a significant body of work investigating cannabinoids for their potential use as therapeutics.
To date, no endocannabinoid system (ECS)-modulating drug has been approved for clinical use in the eye; however, recent advances in our understanding of the ECS, as well as new pharmacological tools, has renewed interest in the development of ocular ECS-based therapeutics.
This review summarizes the current state-of-affairs for the use of ECS-modulating drugs for the treatment of glaucoma and ocular inflammatory and ischemic disease.”
“The endocannabinoid system (ECS) is an inter-cellular signalling mechanism that is present in the islets of Langerhans and plays a role in the modulation of insulin secretion and beta-cell mass expansion.
The mammalian target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) is a key intra-cellular pathway involved in energy homeostasis and known to importantly affect pancreatic islet’s physiology.
These findings suggest a functional interaction between the ECS and the mTORC1 pathway within the endocrine pancreas and at the whole organism level, which could have implications for the development of new therapeutic approaches for pancreatic beta-cell diseases.”
“The biological activities of cannabidiol (CBD), a major non-psychotropic constituent of the fiber-type cannabis plant, have been examined in detail (e.g., CBD modulation of body weight in mice and rats).
However, few studies have investigated the biological activities of cannabidiol-2′,6′-dimethyl ether (CBDD), a dimethyl ether derivative of the parent CBD.
We herein focused on the effects of CBDD on body weight changes in mice, and demonstrated that it stimulated body weight gain in apolipoprotein E (ApoE)-deficient BALB/c. KOR/Stm Slc-Apoe(shl) mice, especially between 10 and 20 weeks of age.”
“Cannabis has a long history of medicinal use.
Cannabis-based medications (cannabinoids) are based on its active element, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), and have been approved for medical purposes.
Cannabinoids may be a useful therapeutic option for people with chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting that respond poorly to commonly used anti-emetic agents (anti-sickness drugs).
Cannabis-based medications may be useful for treating refractory chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting.”
“Cannabidiol (CBD) is a non-psychoactive constituent of Cannabis sativa with potential to treat neurodegenerative diseases.
Its neuroprotection has been mainly associated with anti-inflammatory and antioxidant events; however, other mechanisms might be involved.
We investigated the involvement of neuritogenesis, NGF receptors (trkA), NGF, and neuronal proteins in the mechanism of neuroprotection of CBD against MPP+ toxicity in PC12 cells…
This is the first study to report the involvement of neuronal proteins and trkA in the neuroprotection of CBD.
Our findings suggest that CBD has a neurorestorative potential independent of NGF that might contribute to its neuroprotection against MPP+, a neurotoxin relevant to Parkinson’s disease.”
“Research on the health effects of marijuana use in light of its increased medical use and the current obesity epidemic is needed. Our objective was to explore the relationship between marijuana use and metabolic syndrome across stages of adulthood…
Current marijuana users had lower odds of presenting with metabolic syndrome than never users. Among emerging adults, current marijuana users were 54% less likely than never users to present with metabolic syndrome. Current and past middle-aged adult marijuana users were less likely to have metabolic syndrome than never users.
Current marijuana use is associated with lower odds of metabolic syndrome across emerging and middle-aged US adults.”
“Cannabinoid (CB) agonists suppress nausea in humans and animal models; yet, their underlying neural substrates remain largely unknown.
Evidence suggests that the visceral insular cortex (VIC) plays a critical role in nausea. Given the expression of CB1 receptors and the presence of endocannabinoids in this brain region, we hypothesized that the VIC endocannabinoid system regulates nausea…
Taken together, these findings provide compelling evidence that acute nausea selectively increases 2-AG in the VIC, and suggests that 2-AG signaling within the VIC regulates nausea by reducing neuronal activity in this forebrain region.”
“Dimethylheptyl-cannabidiol (DMH-CBD), a non-psychoactive, synthetic derivative of the phytocannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD), has been reported to be anti-inflammatory in RAW macrophages.
Here, we evaluated the effects of DMH-CBD at the transcriptional level in BV-2 microglial cells as well as on the proliferation of encephalitogenic T cells…
The results show that DMH-CBD has similar anti-inflammatory properties to those of CBD.
DMH-CBD downregulates the expression of inflammatory cytokines and protects the microglial cells by inducing an adaptive cellular response against inflammatory stimuli and oxidative injury.”