Using Cannabinoids for Pain Management

One of the most common uses of medical cannabis is to treat chronic pain. But how do cannabinoids relieve pain? Read on.

Benefits of Cannabis for Pain Management

Cannabis medicine has gained increased focus and importance in recent years with regards to pain management and treatment. Not only is cannabis commonly sought out as an alternative to traditional pain medications, but also as a treatment option for conditions known to be treatment resistant, and more critically as a tool to be used in opioid use reduction strategies and in reducing opioid related deaths.

The sensations of pain are a natural result of the body’s response to the experience or perception of injury or illness. Damaged cells signal the brain, resulting in the sensation of pain.

The body’s endocannabinoid system (ECS) plays a role in the process of pain signalling. This pain signalling can be suppressed or blocked by activating the CB1 receptors of the ECS. Cannabinoid medicine treatment can also result in noticeable improvements in sensations of mobility pain, and pain at rest.

In countries and jurisdictions where access to cannabis medicine products has been legalized and/or decriminalized, pain is among the top conditions prioritized by health care providers specializing in cannabinoid medicine treatment.

Pain can have many causes both known and unknown, and can often be the result of a variety of interconnected factors.

CHRONIC PAIN

Worldwide, chronic pain is among the most common factors in patient reported years lived with disability. Individuals experience chronic pain differently in both severity and duration. For many the source of their pain may be elusive and remain undiagnosed. These sensations of pain can at times be constant, or experienced in unpredictable intervals or waves.

NEUROPATHIC PAIN

When a patient suffers nerve damage from an injury or illness, pain signaling can persist well beyond the healing time of the initial injury itself. Patients with neuropathic pain may experience persistent or episodic sensations of burning, tingling, sharp, or stabbing/shooting pain. Studies have shown that cannabinoids have the potential to cause a significant reduction in neuropathic pain symptoms.

CANCER RELATED PAIN

Pain related to cancer can often be the result of tumors applying pressure to soft tissue, organs, nerves and/or bones. Pain is also an associated side effect of common cancer treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy and surgery. Patients using cannabis medicine have reported varying levels of reduction in cancer related pain.

OPIOID USE REDUCTION

The primary focus of pain treatment is to improve overall pain management and to limit the impacts on an individual’s activities of daily life. With this focus in mind and with the information available at the time, many doctors all over the world for the past several decades have prescribed opiates for the treatment of pain more and more frequently and in higher doses. This has resulted in what many characterize as a crisis of opioid related use disorder and mortality.

This growing crisis has driven a fundamental need to source effective and evidence-based treatment options for reducing the pain management community’s reliance on prescription opioids. Cannabis medicine has proven not only to be an effective alternative to beginning the use of high-dose opioids in the first place, it has also been shown to be useful as an opioid-sparing medication. By reducing the overall opioid dosage potency required to achieve pain symptom management, the use of cannabis medicine along with opioids can reduce daily dosage needs, and thus potentially reduce the occurrence of opioid-related overdose and death.

In jurisdictions where access to cannabis has already been granted, there is often a correlated reduction in the total number of opioid prescriptions given by health care providers, as well as a reduction in the duration of dosage supplied. Researchers have also noted reductions in the prescribing of other drugs such as gabapentin and pregabalin.

While studies are still ongoing, additional research is needed to fully understand the therapeutic potentials and possible side effects of cannabis medicine as a treatment option for pain and as an opioid use reduction tool.

To begin your cannabis medicine journey today, book an appointment now with the Savikalpa Virtual Clinic for an online doctor consultation, or request more information from a member of our highly trained clinic staff (eclinic@savikalpa.com).

We pride ourselves on being one of India’s most qualified sources of fast, friendly, and professional access to cannabinoid medicine online!

Interested in learning more? Send us your questions (eclinic@savikalpa.com). It is our mission to educate patients in any way we can, and we would be delighted to hear from you.

Research regarding cannabis, pain and opiate use reduction:

• The effectiveness of self-directed medical cannabis treatment for pain https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0965229919308040

• Endocannabinoid system and pain: an introduction https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24148358/
• The Effect of Medicinal Cannabis on Pain and Quality-of-Life Outcomes in Chronic Pain: A Prospective Open-label Study https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26889611/
• Cannabis and Pain: A Clinical Review https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5549367/
• Efficacy of Cannabis-Based Medicines for Pain Management: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials. https://europepmc.org/article/med/28934780
• Cannabinoids for Medical Use: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2338251
• Multicenter, Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled, Parallel-Group Study of the Efficacy, Safety, and Tolerability of THC:CBD Extract and THC Extract in Patients with Intractable Cancer-Related Pain https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0885392409007878
• Opioid-Sparing Effect of Cannabinoids: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis https://www.nature.com/articles/npp201751
• Cannabis Use is Associated with Lower Odds of Prescription Opioid Analgesic Use Among HIV-Infected Individuals with Chronic Pain https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10826084.2017.1416408?journalCode=isum20
• Impact of co-administration of oxycodone and smoked cannabis on analgesia and abuse liability https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-018-0011-2
• The Efficacy of Medical Marijuana in the Treatment of Cancer-Related Pain https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/jpm.2019.0374
• Consensus-based recommendations for titrating cannabinoids and tapering opioids for chronic pain control https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ijcp.13871
• The impact of cannabis access laws on opioid prescribing https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167629618309020
• Opioid Prescribing in Canada following the Legalization of Cannabis: A Clinical and Economic Time-Series Analysis https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33491149/

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