“These findings add to the already robust evidence documenting the opioid-sparing effects of medical cannabis.”
Category: Opioids
“Our findings suggest that broadening recreational marijuana access could help address the opioid epidemic.”
“These findings belie that claim that cannabis is a so-called ‘gateway drug’ and reinforces the notion that, for many individuals and for patients especially, it acts as a exit drug.”
“[T]he implementation of medical marijuana laws (MMLs) and recreational marijuana laws (RMLs) reduced morphine milligram equivalents per enrollee by seven percent and 13 percent, respectively.”
“Increased medical and recreational storefront dispensary counts are associated with reduced opioid related mortality rates during the study period. These associations appear particularly strong for deaths related to synthetic opioids such as fentanyl.”
“The findings of this study add to the growing body of evidence that easier access to cannabis for patients with pain may reduce opioid use and partially offset expenditures for both public and private drug plans.”
“Over time, individuals who continued consuming cannabis within this longitudinal study reported lower pain severity and pain interference scores, as well as improved quality of life and general health symptoms scores.”
Investigators reported a “strong positive association” between subjects’ frequency of cannabis use and self-reported improvements in pain, health-care utilization, and overall health-related quality of life.