Benjamin Han, Geriatric and addiction specialist at the University of California-San Diego, tells his students the story of a 76-year-old patient who, like many older people, suffer from insomnia.
“I had problems reconciling the dream and woke up in the middle of the night,” he said. “So his daughter brought him to sleep chew pills,” they were cannabis caramels.
“He tried a gomita after dinner and waited half an hour,” Han explained.
He felt no effect, he chewed another, and then another one: four for several hours.
They have advised patients to try cannabis “start with a low dose and little by little forward”, starting with products that only contain 1 or 2.5 milligrams of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the psychoactive ingredient that is present in many cannabis products. However, each of the four gomites that this patient took contained 10 milligrams.
The woman began to experience intense fear and heart palpitations. A young person could have ignored these symptoms, but this patient had hypertension and atrial fibrillation, a form of heart items. Bang, it was a first aid.
Laboratory tests and cardiac studies have established that the woman did not suffer a heart attack and the staff sent her home. His only persistent symptom was shame, Han said.
But what if he had dizzy or stunned and was injured in a fall? He noted that he had injured patients when they fall or drive after consuming cannabis. What if cannabis had dealt with the prescribed medicines he used?
“As a geriatician I have to think,” said Han. “Our brains become more sensitive to psychoactive substances as we get older.”
Thirty -nin states and the Columbia district They now allow cannabis consumption For medical purposes, and in 24 of those states, and in the district, the Recreational consumption It is also legal. As consumption increases in older adults, “the benefits are not yet clear,” said Han. “But we see more proof of possible damage.”
A wave of recent research emphasizes concern for older consumers: they register increase in emergency situations and hospital admissions with regard to cannabis, and a Canadian study has found a link between this type of acute care and subsequent dementia.
Older people are more likely than young women to try cannabis for therapeutic reasons: to alleviate chronic pain, insomnia or psychological problems, although the proof of their effectiveness to deal with these disorders remains scarce.
In A data analysis From a national survey published on 2 June in the Jama Medical Magazine, Han and his colleagues reported that the current consumption of cannabis (defined as consumption in the previous month) had risen from 4.8% in 2021 to 7% in 2023 in adults of 65 years or more. In 2005, he said, less than 1% of the older adults who had consumed cannabis in the previous year.
What drives this increase? Experts call the constant progress of the statusalization of the state – consumption between seniors is larger in those states – while surveys show that the perception Consuming cannabis has decreased.
A National investigation He revealed that a growing proportion of American adults – 44 % in 2021 – wrongly believed that it was safer to smoke cannabis daily than cigarettes. The authors of the study, published in Jama Network Open, said that “these opinions do not reflect the existing scientific evidence about cannabis and tobacco smoke.”
The cannabis industry also sells its products among older adults. The Trulieve chain offers a 10%discount, both in stores and on the internet, to whom it regards “wise” customers, 55 years or more. Rise Dispensaries implemented a program for education and empowerment on the cannabis of one year for two centers for the elderly in Paterson, New Jersey, including visits to his pharmacy.
The industry has many older customers. Liz Logan, 67, an independent writer of Bronxville, New York, had been dealing with sleep and fear problems for years, but these disorders were particularly weakened two years ago when her husband died because of Parkinson’s Parkinson’s. “I often wake up until 5 or 6 in the morning,” he said. “You go crazy.”
Looking for edible online cannabis products, Logan discovered that the chewable with cannabidiol, known as CBD, did not help in itself, but those who contain 10 milligrams of THC did without remarkable side effects. “I’m not worried about sleeping anymore,” he said. “I have solved a life problem.”
Studies in the United States and Canada, where, however, Consumption was legalized Non -medical cannabis for adults nationwide in 2018, show an increase in cannabis consumption rates with regard to medical care in the elderly, both in both outpatient environments Like in hospitals.
For example in California, Wishing for emergency Related to cannabis in people aged 65 or older, they rose to 395 per 100,000 visits in 2019, were around 21 in 2005. In Ontario, acute attention was derived (that is, emergency situations or international visits) derived from cannabis consumption between medium -size adults between adults between 2008 and 2021, and and 2021, and more than 26 times Among people 65 years or older.
“This does not reflect everyone who consumes cannabis,” said Daniel Myran, researcher at the Bruyère Health Institute of Ottawa and main author of the Ontario Study. “He conquers people with more serious patterns.”
However, because other studies have been demonstrated Higher heart risk Among some cannabis consumers with heart conditions or diabetes, “there are different warning signals,” he said.
N recent research by Jama Open revealed that an alarming share of older veterans currently consume cannabis They give positive In the cannabis consumption disorder test.
As with other addictions, these patients can “tolerate large quantities,” said the most important author, VIA Pravosud, a cannabis researcher at the Northern California Institute for Research and Education. “They continue to consume, even if it disrupts their social, work or family obligations” and can experience the withdrawal syndrome if they leave it.
Among the 4,500 older veterans (with an average age of 73) who looked for care in the health centers of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), the Researchers discovered That more than 10% had reported cannabis consumption in the last 30 days. 36% of this met the criteria of Cannabis consumption disorder Mild, moderate or serious, as established in the diagnostic and statistical manual for psychological disorders.
VA patients differ from the general population, said Pravosud. They are much more likely to report substance abuse and have “higher percentages of chronic diseases and disabilities, and mental disorders such as TPE [trastorno por estrés post traumático]”That they could promote self -medication, he said.
The current VA policy does not require doctors to ask patients about cannabis consumption. Pravosud thinks they should do it.
Moreover, because “there is more and more evidence of a possible effect on memory and cognition,” said Myran, referring to the study of his team about Ontarium patients with cannabis -related disorders that went into emergency situations or were admitted to the hospital.
In comparison with other patients of the same age and gender who looked for care for other reasons, research showed that these patients (from 45 to 105 years) had a risk that was 1.5 times larger than a diagnosis of dementia within five years and 3.9 times higher compared to the general population.
Even after correction for chronic disorders and socioodemographic factors, which were looking for acute care as a result of cannabis consumption had a 23% higher risk than patients with diseases that are not related to cannabis, and a risk of 72% greater than that of the general population.
None of these studies were random clinical studies, the researchers said; They were observational and could not determine causality. Some research into cannabis does not indicate whether users smoke, vaper, take or rub topic cannabis in the painful joints; Other studies do not have relevant demographic information.
“It is very frustrating that we can no longer offer individualized guidelines for safer consumer modes and about the quantities of consumption that seem less risk,” Myran said. “This simply emphasizes that the rapid expansion of regular cannabis consumption in North America conquers our knowledge.”
Yet, given the vulnerabilities of the health of older adults and the much greater power of current cannabis products compared to the marijuana they consumed in their youth, he and other researchers ask for caution.
“If we consider cannabis as a medicine, we must be open to the idea that there are groups that probably should not consume and that there are possible adverse effects,” he said. “Because this applies to all medicines.”
The new age takes place in collaboration with The New York Times.
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