Cluster attacks responsive to recreational cannabis and dronabinol.

Abstract

“Pharmacological preparations of cannabinoid compounds have a variety of therapeutic uses in medicine, including different pain syndromes, but have not been previously reported as beneficial for cluster headache. We present a patient with cluster headache who was refractory to multiple acute and preventive medications but successfully aborted his attacks with recreational marijuana use; subsequent use of dronabinol provided equally effective pain relief. The beneficial effect may be related to the high concentration of cannabinoid receptors in the hypothalamus, which has been implicated as a site of dysfunction in neuroimaging studies of patients with cluster headache.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19220500

Hallucinogens and cannabinoids for headache.

“Most hallucinogens and cannabinoids fall into Federal Controlled Substances schedule 1, meaning they cannot be prescribed by practitioners, allegedly have no accepted medical use, and have a high abuse potential. The legal and regulatory status has inhibited clinical research on these substances such that there are no blinded studies from which to assess true efficacy. Despite such classification, hallucinogens and cannabinoids are used by patients with headache on occasion.

 Cannabinoids in particular have a long history of use for headache and migraine before prohibition and are still used by patients as a migraine abortive.

 Hallucinogens are being increasing used by cluster headache patients outside of physician recommendation mainly to abort a cluster period and to maintain quiescence for which there is considerable anecdotal success.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23030539

CB1 and CB2 receptor mRNA expression in human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from various donor types

“Marijuana cannabinoid receptors (CBR), CB1 and CB2… CB1 and CB2 receptor mRNA expression in human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) from various donor types… results suggest that CBR expression is relatively constant across the human population.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11727770

Expression of cannabinoid receptors and their gene transcripts in human blood cells.

Food for thought: ” Normal human volunteers who do not use marijuana have genes that encode for the marijuana (cannabinoid) receptor proteins… We therefore concluded that the existence of… Expression of cannabinoid receptors and their gene transcripts in human blood cells.”— Human blood contains cannabinoid receptors.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10621950

The endocannabinoid system and neurogenesis in health and disease.

Consuming plant cannabinoids leads to neurogenesis (birth of neurons), thanks to the endocannabinoid system.

“The endocannabinoid system exerts an important neuromodulatory function in different brain areas and is also known to be involved in the regulation of neural cell fate.

Thus, CB(1) cannabinoid receptors are neuroprotective in different models of brain injury, and their expression is altered in various neurodegenerative diseases. Recent findings have demonstrated the presence of a functional endocannabinoid system in neural progenitor cells that participates in the regulation of cell proliferation and differentiation.

In this Research Update, the authors address the experimental evidence regarding the regulatory role of cannabinoids in neurogenesis and analyze them in the context of those pathological disorders in which cannabinoid function and altered neuronal or glial generation is most relevant, for example, stroke and multiple sclerosis.”

Food for thought: endocannabinoid modulation of lipogenesis

TRUTH: “Cannabis has been used since antiquity for the treatment of many ailments, including pain, rheumatoid arthritis, epilepsy, and eating disorders…”— “And God said … herb bearing seed … it is GOOD … it shall be for FOOD.” – Genesis 1:29

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1087183/?tool=pubmed