CBD has time and again shown that it can help the brain, quite the opposite of what THC does. For a long time, the cannabis plant was only looked at with squinted, doubtful eyes because of how it affected people. However, the past few years have given CBD, the non-psychoactive component of weed, its due importance.
It has been found that CBD can be useful in pain management as well as anxiety reduction. It has been shown to have anticancer properties and it can help in the treatment of arthritis, epilepsy, and ADHD. Furthermore, while on one hand, THC is an addictive drug, CBD can help with recovery from drug addiction as per a 2018 study.
This study shows that CBD’s application can reduce risk of relapse among people who are addicts of drugs or alcohol. Let’s dive into the details of this study below:
What Did The Study Reveal?
A new research published in the Neuropsychopharmacology journal by Springer Nature has found an ingredient in the Cannabis Sativa plant that is non-psychoactive, can help stay clean from drug use. This preclinical study was carried out on rats and it showed that a particular cannabis ingredient can take down relapse risk among people who are recovering from drug and alcohol addiction.
This study speaks in the favor of the possible benefits of certain cannabinoids which have medicinal properties as well. Basically, CBD in cannabis has been shown to be helpful in the treatment of psychiatric and neurological disorders. This study shows it potential in the treatment of addiction of alcohol and drugs.
For the purpose of this study, researchers applied a CBD-containing gel onto the rats’ skin once per day for a week. These rats had a history of voluntary alcohol or cocaine use on a daily basis and hence, they exhibited addiction-like behavior. Several different tests were performed to see how these animals reacted to stress and anxiety causing situations and tests were done to see their impulsivity, which is a trait linked to addiction.
Results showed that CBD reduced risk of relapse as well as anxiety and impulsivity in the addicted rats. More investigation revealed that CBD was entirely eliminated from the rats’ brains three days after the therapy was conducted. However, surprisingly, even 5 months following the treatment the rats still showed a reduced relapse effect. This shows that CBD has potential when it comes to helping drug addicts with recovery from addiction by reducing relapse risk.
The team lead of this researchers’ group, Friedbert Weiss, said, “Drug addicts enter relapse vulnerability states for multiple reasons. Therefore, effects such as these observed with CBD that concurrently ameliorate several of these are likely to be more effective in preventing relapse than treatments targeting only a single state.”
With this now known, researchers have been diving deeper to study the potential of CBD in helping people recover from addiction.
