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Study: Some May Benefit from Medical Marijuana for Neuropathic Pain
August 7, 2008

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Research Summary

A group of HIV patients with neuropathic pain that did not respond to conventional pain relievers found benefits from the use of medical marijuana, HealthDay News reported Aug. 6.

Recent research, encompassing 28 HIV patients, involved adding medicinal marijuana to the individuals' existing pain medication. Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine found that 46 percent of patients smoking medical marijuana reported clinically meaningful pain relief, while 18 percent who smoked a placebo reported this level of relief.

The research was sponsored by the University of California Center for Medical Cannabis Research, and the results were found to be consistent with other center studies finding short-term benefits from medical marijuana for neuropathic pain management.

Results of the latest study were published online Aug. 6 in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology.

This article summarizes an external report or press release on research published in a scientific journal. When available, links to the sources are provided above.

COMMENTS ON THIS ARTICLE:

Posted by kat on 13 Aug 08 01:33 PM EDT
I do have a chronic neurological pain condition. I manage it with exercise, diet and positive thinking in that order. About twice a month I have to use a med to take the edge off and allow me to breathe and sleep. I have worked in the addictions field for 24 years. In my experience those that now have medical marijuana started smoking marijuana in their early teens. Now they have figured out how to practice their addictions legally. A good portion have never attempted pain control with legal dose specific medications. I haven't found one yet that has tried legal dose specific Marinol which is now not only in liquid but pill form.

Posted by jeff kushner on 09 Aug 08 12:22 AM EDT
I would put my trust in the American Medical Association. Did anyone think about asking them about appropriate "medicine" for this problem?

Posted by Brian Shea on 08 Aug 08 04:55 PM EDT
All I ask of everyone commenting is, have you ever been in constant day-in-day-out pain and there is nothing "legally," you can do about it. A pain that affects everything else you do in life. If you answer yes to this or put yourself in that person’s shoes wouldn’t you want a medicine that can relieve that pain and allow you to embrace each day you have left on this earth?

Posted by Gene Taylor on 08 Aug 08 12:46 PM EDT
The vast majority of people use marijuana to get high, not for medicinal reasons.

Posted by Donald B Parsons on 08 Aug 08 12:27 PM EDT
I just had to voice my opinion on this and my opinion is, "what HE (Jon Gettel) said." I believe a part of that message is resonating with some lawmakers as the DEA's advertising budget was dropped from $100 million a year to $60 million a year. This act made them rethink their ads and now are going after PRESCRIPTION DRUGS. The ads will be aimed at educating the parents and grand parents about teens and missing drugs from unlocked medicine cabinets. Teens laugh off the anti-drug commercials of yester-year and even more recent ones.

Posted by Jon Gettel on 08 Aug 08 09:08 AM EDT
Marijuana is medicine. Stop the war on marijuana today!

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