Risk-Benefit Profile of Commonly
Used Herbs - Legal & Otherwise
by Dr. Rick Bayer
Alternatives Magazine
Summer-2002: Issue 22
Physicians and consumers need reliable information
on medical herbs. The popularity of such therapy in the US is
growing rapidly but the science is not progressing as rapidly
as sales. In the January 1st, 2002 Annals of Internal Medicine,
Dr. Edzard Ernst (from the UK) wrote The Risk-Benefit Profile
of Commonly Used Herbal Therapies: Ginkgo, St. John’s Wort,
Ginseng, Echinacea, Saw Palmetto, and Kava. The Annals has a history
of conservative politics (for example, they oppose the Oregon
Death With Dignity Act and have written scathing half-truths about
the medical use of marijuana). With those conservative politics
in mind, I have provided the following review of Dr. Ernst’s
article.
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The 8th Herb: Medicinal Marijuana
What would happen if we took an enlightened pro-patient approach
and applied the same risk-benefit profile to medical cannabis/marijuana
as was applied to the previous seven herbs?
Towards that end, addictions specialist nurse,
Mary Lynn Mathre, from the University of Virginia, and her nonprofit
group, Patients Out of Time (www.MedicalCannabis.com/) presented
The Second National Clinical Conference on Cannabis Therapeutics
on May 3 & 4, in Portland. The conference theme was Analgesia
and Other Indications and was co-sponsored by the Oregon Department
of Human Services, Oregon Nurses Association, Mothers Against
Misuse and Abuse, and the Portland Community College (PCC) Institute
of Health Professionals.* Patients Out of Time presented their
first conference at the University of Iowa in 2000.
Cannabinoids are the scientific name for
the natural agents found uniquely in the cannabis plant but includes
the synthetic compounds made in the lab (synthetic cannabinoids)
and naturally occurring hormones in our body that are similar
to cannabis (endogenous cannabinoids). The main psychoactive ingredient
in cannabis is THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) although there are many
other cannabinoids in cannabis such as cannabidiol. The only cannabinoid
that doctors can prescribe is synthetic oral THC called dronabinol
and sold under the brand name Marinol&Mac226; which under
the Controlled Substances Act is a schedule III drug (same group
as acetaminophen with codeine).
Conference Findings
On Friday, May 3, Dr. Esther Fride from Israel reviewed the molecular
biology of cannabinoids and how they work in the body. She explained
how cannabinoids and opioid pain medicine (like morphine) work
together in a synergistic fashion. New research shows there are
at least three different endogenous cannabinoids. One of these
has been shown to be essential for suckling in newborn rat pups.
If the action of the cannabinoid is blocked with an antagonist
drug, the newborn pups do not suckle and thus die. Therefore,
not only is the internal cannabinoid system important for pain
control but it also regulates important appetite areas in the
brain that are essential for life in newborn mammals.
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