Research into the medical uses of cannabis continues to provide medical solutions for many health problems. A new discovery finds that marijuana may be the key to curing the slow cognitive decline associated with Alzheimer’s disease. Nerve cells die naturally as we age. But Alzheimer’s disease leads to rapid cell death that happens faster than usual.
The unfortunate nature of Alzheimer’s disease and other cognitive disorders like dementia is that the brain dies faster than the body. Thus, it leaves the person struggling to recall essential things. For example, they can’t recall turning off the stove or remembering where they live.
Memory, cognitive processing, and even behavior can be affected by this disease.Often, the lives of family members are affected in significant ways. That’s because they struggle to find help for their rapidly deteriorating elder. A cure in the form of medicinal marijuana is a potential ray of sunshine in a gloomy prognosis.
Researchers Discover: Marijuana May Be The Key To Curing Alzheimer’s Disease
In this article, we will look at what Alzheimer’s disease is. We also explore how researchers discovered a link between marijuana’s healing power and curing dementia.
What Are the Symptoms of Alzheimer’s Disease?
Alzheimer’s is a type of dementia or disease of the brain. The Alzheimer’s Association says that early onset Alzheimer’s disease can begin as early as the ages of 40 or 50. It first presents as slight loss of brain functioning. Problems with memory and thought processes are the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease.
Alzheimer’s disease begins with minor memory lapses but gets more severe at a more rapid progression than would be seen with normal aging. Memory is not just the only brain function that is impaired. But even performing simple math problems or completing a task with verbal instructions becomes increasingly tricky.
Newly learned information should be fresh in your mind in a normally functioning brain, but Alzheimer’s disease robs people of the ability to recall things they just learned. Most often, it is friends or family members who begin to be concerned about signs of memory loss in a loved one, and they are the ones who then become responsible for getting help for the person who is going through dementia.
The Alzheimer’s Association warns that Alzheimer’s advances, symptoms worsening over time. These include the following:
- Disorientation
- Mood and behavioral changes
- Worsening confusion about events, time, and place
- Unfounded suspicions regarding family, friends, and professional caregivers
- More severe memory loss and behavioral changes
- Difficulty speaking, chewing, swallowing, and walking.
Research on the Use of Marijuana to Cure Cognitive Disorders like AD
Alzheimer’s disease may come from the accumulation of proteins in neurons. Beta-amyloid is one of these proteins that can increase in the brain as we age. The natural medical miracle of marijuana may be the key, according to these research discoveries, to curing Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers at the Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory at The Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, CA, say that intracellular beta-amyloid initiates a toxic inflammatory response that leads to cell death in the brain. Both psychoactive cannabinoids, like the THC in cannabis that get you high. The non-psychoactive cannabinoid compounds CBD, stimulates the removal of beta-amyloid, block the inflammatory response, and provide protection.
The data from the study showed that there is an inflammatory response within nerve cells that is caused by the accumulation of intracellular beta-amyloid proteins. This protein accumulation in nerve cells leads to early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, and the progression of the disease can be cured by stimulating the cannabinoid receptors of the brain.
The researchers at The Salk Institute for Biological Studies concluded that ‘5-LOX inhibitors, cannabinoids, and caspase inhibitors can completely prevent cell death. However, once the cell death process is underway, death can be reduced by some prostaglandins.’
An additional study on medical marijuana and AD
A research study by the Endocannabinoid Research Group, Institute of Biomolecular Chemistry based in Naples, Italy, that reviewed the previous research on cannabis receptors in the brain found that ‘the available data indicate that endocannabinoids are likely to play in this disorder a role similar to that suggested in other neurodegenerative diseases, that is, to represent an endogenous adaptive response aimed at counteracting both the neurochemical and inflammatory consequences of -amyloid-induced tau protein hyperactivity, possibly the most crucial underlying cause of AD.
Furthermore, plant and synthetic cannabinoids, particularly the non-psychotropic cannabidiol, might also exert other non-cannabinoid receptor-mediated protective effects. These can include anti-oxidant actions. There is evidence, from in vivo studies on -amyloid-induced neurotoxicity, also for a possible causative role of endocannabinoids in the impairment of memory retention. That’s typical of AD. This might open the way to using cannabinoid receptor antagonists as therapeutic drugs for treating cognitive deficits in the more advanced phases of this disorder.’
Final Thoughts on Medical Marijuana and Alzheimer’s Disease
Many states have approved the use of medical marijuana for certain debilitating conditions. Medical use of cannabis is approved for Alzheimer’s disease therapy in several states as medical marijuana. A Google search for your state’s approved medical conditions for cannabis use will help you find out if this natural medical miracle can help you or your loved ones slow Alzheimer’s disease.
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