• Neuroscience & Pharmacology Discussion Welcome Guest
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules
    Recent Journal Articles Chemistry Mega-Thread
    FREE Chemistry Databases! Self-Education Guide

  • N&PD Moderators: Skorpio

Cannabis and Psychotic Disorders

Status
Not open for further replies.
A

AlphaMethylPhenyl

Moderator: TDS
Staff member
Joined
Jul 2, 2008
Messages
9,522
Location
Liminal
Does Cannabis use lead to psychotic disorders and/or is it unhealthy to take the substance if one has a psychotic disorder?

I know that some studies say it brings out and in some cases causes schizophrenia; is this believable?

What about that people with psychotic disorders are more likely to use cannabis, or "self-medicate" with it? Is it perhaps a constructive thing to do?

Of course I believe that it can cause a specific psychosis if one takes too much, but does it also cause/bring out mental illness (as in, a permanent rather than just short-term handicap?

I just wanted people's opinions on this; those who frequent ADD are probably more likely to be reputable than people in other sub-forums, but this is just a generalization. Please everybody I want your viewpoint! Studies would be nice.

I know that some say the dopamine amount precipitated by cannabis rivals that of heroin. Regardless there is a lot of D1 activity and reduction in GABA, the latters increase which can prevent psychosis. I also know that it can increase nor-epinepherine in certain parts of the brain, yet reduces it and acetylcholline in the hippocampus, which is anti-psychotic in effect. But I'm trying to put my finger on permanent effects, so that doesn't carry a lot of weight. Just some interesting information.
 
Last edited:
Cannabis has, on more than one occasion, pushed me over the psychosis line while on a stimulant binge. It's usually on day 4 of the binge, I'll have experienced no psychotic symptoms up until then, then suddenly I totally lose my mind and start texting people and posting forum threads (not just here :P) consisting of word salads. I'm always fine the next day though. I wonder what makes it so that I can stand days of massive dopamine release by stimulants and be pretty much entirely there mentally but it's a normal amount of weed that makes me lose my mind and go in to full blown psycho-mode.
 
Last edited:
Ho-Chi-Minh said:
I know that some studies say it brings out and in some cases causes schizophrenia; is this believable?

What about that people with psychotic disorders are more likely to use cannabis, or "self-medicate" with it? Is it perhaps a constructive thing to do?

Of course I believe that it can cause a specific psychosis if one takes too much, but does it also cause/bring out mental illness (as in, a permanent rather than just short-term handicap?
Click to expand...

Unfortunately there's no way to distinguish between these two possibilities in human subjects (ethically). The studies you're referring to simply monitored rates and age of onset of psychosis, as well as preceding cannabis use. The results generally showed earlier age of onset of psychotic symptoms and higher rates of psychosis in people who used cannabis regularly compared to those who didn't. This article has a good review:

http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/schizophrenia/content/article/10168/2017327

To distinguish between the two possible explanations you mentioned you would have to get a large group of adolescents, give half of them cannabis every day for years, and ensure that the other half never took cannabis, then look for differences between your groups. If you still saw the same differences then you could say the cannabis caused the psychosis. If the groups had no differences then you could argue that people who are already predisposed to psychosis are also predisposed to use cannabis (self-medicating hypothesis). Barring something like that, no one will have a definitive answer to your questions.

Interestingly schizophrenic individuals are 3 times more likely to be cigarette smokers at age of onset than healthy individuals, but we aren't flooded with press releases about nicotine causing schizophrenia. Just some food for thought.
 
JackiesBabyy said:
Thank you for letting me know it wasn't lingering psychotic symptoms when I thought this thread looked familiar.
Click to expand...

And, with that said this thread is locked.
1) we don't do multiposts in ADD unless its a tangent off another subject or its gotten an absurd amount of replies.
2) cannabis is probably not a good idea for any severe mental illness. Yes I know there's that one bipolar/depressed person everyone knows that swears by it, but until more research comes out on it and we can better regulate the contents of cannabis its not going to be something I recommend.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top