Cancer

Gliomas (tumors in the brain) are especially aggressive malignant forms of cancer, often resulting in the deaths of affected patients within the 12 to 18 months following diagnosis. There is no cure for gliomas and most available treatments provide only minor symptomatic relief.

A review of the modern scientific literature reveals numerous preclinical studies, as well as a limited number of case reports and human studies, demonstrating cannabinoids’ ability to act as antineoplastic agents, particularly on glioma cell lines.

Experts acknowledge that there exists solid scientific evidence supporting that cannabinoids exhibit a remarkable anticancer activity in preclinical models of cancer and that cannabinoids may one day “represent a new class of anticancer drugs that retard cancer growth, inhibit angiogenesis and the metastatic spreading of cancer cells.” Presently, medical cannabis use is prevalent among patients with various types of cancer, though many say that they “desire but are not receiving information about cannabis use during their treatment from oncology providers.” Despite an absence of large-scale clinical trials, “abundant anecdotal reports describe patients having remarkable responses to cannabis as an anticancer agent, especially when taken as a high-potency orally ingested concentrate. … [Further] human studies should be conducted to address critical questions related to the foregoing effects.”

Source: American Cancer Society