Medical Cannabis: the basics
We have all heard how popular cannabis treatment is, and it’s becoming a common medical treatment. Medical Cannabis is now available as a Schedule 8 drug in Australia.
There are probably still a number of people that don’t understand much about it, so we would like to clarify a few things.
It is derived directly from the plant,and over one hundred active chemicals are in that cannabinoid family.
Under normal healthy circumstances in our bodies, we manufacture cannabinoids but with some situations and illnesses it is believed that the balance is compromised.
The two most abundant receptors in our bodies (these receptors are things on cells that take information from those particular chemicals), the first is called CB1 – they are in the cerebrum and all those areas that make up your brain, this is where you will find those kind of receptors. The other one is CB2 and that is located in the nervous and immune periphery, throughout, that system in our body, which is where you find those kind of receptors.
There are two main chemicals are – THC that is the one you all think about smoking marijuana and how you get the pychotropic effects, it is still a very useful chemical for pain relief, and may reduce nausea and has anti-inflammatory properties. The other chemical you may or may not have heard of is CBD, that is non-intoxicating and you cannot get high from that, however it also has pain relieving and anti-inflammatory properties and may reduce anxiety and also very importantly, anti-convulsing properties, those anti-convulsing properties are very important for people that suffer from quite severe epilepsy conditions.
An the other thing it can do is modulate the effects of THC and that become really important because of the treatment regimens that are available, they use a ratio of those two chemicals, different ratios suit different kinds of conditions, and that then covers a whole range of illnesses that it can treat, like cancer pain, fibromyalgia, spacticity, inflammation, chronic pain, neuropathic pain, ADHD, depression, PTSD, epilepsy and the list goes on. And that is how it is becoming such a useful medicine in recent times.
If you would like to know more about it or if you think you have a chronic condition, that this may help, have a talk to your GP or come into Border Compounding Pharmacy Our pharmacists are happy to talk through any pain issues you may have, and discuss a number of alternative pain medications that are now available.
Contact Border Compounding Pharmacy