Pain is one of the most well-known — and most debilitating — side effects of cancer and cancer treatment. Cancer pain can greatly reduce patients’ quality of life, which is why pain management is a top focus of cancer treatment teams. Unfortunately, existing treatment protocol isn’t always adequate to relieve cancer pain. Some have asked about cannabis for cancer pain: Is It Effective?
When cancer pain management falls short, some patients look to cannabis. If you’re curious about cannabis for cancer pain management, here’s what you need to know.
What causes cancer pain?
Pain is so common in cancer patients that it’s considered a warning sign of cancer. Cancer causes pain when a tumor presses on bones, nerves, or organs, or when cancer spreads to bone. Cancer treatment can also cause pain. Patients may experience pain at their surgical site, develop neuropathic pain as a result of chemotherapy, have sensitive skin following radiation therapy, or even experience phantom pain after losing a breast or limb.
Controlling cancer pain is critical for patients’ quality of life. While mild pain may be controlled with over-the-counter medications like acetaminophen and NSAIDs, opioids are needed for more severe cancer pain. However, some patients are wary of opioids due to stigma while others dislike the side effects, which can include nausea, coordination loss, and drowsiness. For some patients who do take opioids, it’s not enough to provide adequate pain relief.
These problems have led some cancer patients to turn to cannabis for relief. But is cannabis for cancer pain really safe, effective, and legal?
Cannabis for cancer: safe and legal?
The legal status of cannabis has changed so rapidly in recent years that it can be hard to keep up. However, there are more states where consumers can legally buy cannabis products than not. Depending on location, that may mean consumers can legally purchase recreational marijuana, medical marijuana, or medical CBD products.
Cannabis is also generally considered safe, although that doesn’t mean it’s risk-free. Marijuana causes short-term cognitive impairment that affects users’ thinking, memory, and coordination and may also cause drowsiness and dizziness. This could worsen certain side effects of cancer treatment. CBD, a cannabis compound that doesn’t produce a “high,” has fewer risks than marijuana, but some users report fatigue, drowsiness, and gastrointestinal issues when taking CBD, and CBD can interact with certain medications.
These side effects mean cannabis isn’t right for every cancer patient, nor is cannabis legal everywhere. Cancer patients who are interested in medical marijuana or CBD should start by researching cannabis laws and familiarizing themselves with cannabis-related language, administration methods, and dosages before talking to their doctor.
How cannabis treats cancer pain
Safety and legality concerns aside, does cannabis actually work to relieve cancer pain? As the ASCO Post discusses, there’s no high-quality scientific evidence to support cannabis for pain relief. However, existing studies do show a correlation between cannabinoid use and improvements in pain, nausea, vomiting, and sleep problems.
There are two pathways by which cannabis reduces pain. First, both CBD and THC reduce inflammation to relieve pain associated with surgery, radiation, swelling, or muscle aches. THC and CBD also influence nervous system receptors to reduce the strength of pain signals that are sent to the brain. Through this pathway, cannabis has the potential to relieve both inflammatory and neuropathic pain.
Although cannabis research is still a work in progress, pain has risen to the top reason that people seek medical marijuana. However, like other medications and supplements, cancer patients shouldn’t dabble in cannabis products without talking to their doctor beforehand. Since cannabis carries a risk of medication interaction, it should only be added to a treatment regimen after a doctor’s careful approval.
By Scott Sanders
