...the impact on lung function.
Not just the lungs, inhalation also affect arteries and smoking with significantly more severity.
Deposition of substances in the airways impairs the function of the cilia that remove foreign substances.
Some work has been done by Enrico Bouchard, inventor of the Sublimator years ago, trying to improve bio-availability by heat-shrinking the microscopic droplets of cannabic vapour so these would also pass into the bloodstream via capilaries, in addition to the alveolar barrier. It's not clear how much of it was marketing but there's been at least one other effort made to rejuvenate this idea and a reference to it got deleted for some foolish reason recently...
Whenever I start smoking flower or even concentrates semi regularly I start coughing in the mornings. Do any of you have this issue as well?
I've addressed this problem with a multi-scenario experiment in 2012 trying to decide between causes/solutions as cold/hot & dry/moist. The conclusion motivated my switch to the VaporGenie system at the cost of a years-long customization effort, centered on the fact that clean-burning butane generates its own water vapour besides carbonic gas. It allowed me to abandon the HerbalAire slow/steady ovenizer-based consumption model and never look back.
All of my stuff is from legal dispensaries with strict testing.
The only « strict » way i can think of is when no 3rd-parties are involved, though i'll agree testing for pathogens is no luxury. Too bad the « legal=safe » slogan in only an illusion.
I'm considering switching to edibles only because it sucks so much, even though I do like smoking sometimes...
Well, smoking isn't the best option in a forum dedicated to « HR », while edibles are nothing like inhalation i'm afraid. Yet, even inhalation alone sub-divides into many types hardly suited for direct comparisons, so maybe your intuition will prove appropriate to you after all. But then cannabis will never be the same unless you grow your own and find an HR-compatible consumption method...
Let me suggest you to consider this home-made reality-filter of mine as you progress in this serious reflexion:
#1) Neuro-plasticity;
#2) Contaminants;
#3) Consumption Method & Ritual;
#4) Socio-toxic 3rd-party interference
Right now i'd say all 4 apply in the situation you've described.
By the way, i did personally observe the paradoxal effect mentioned previously. Keep in mind in the victorian age cannabis cigarettes were sold to help with asthma...