• Clin J Pain · Aug 2024

    Self-Medication Paths: A Descriptive Study Unveiling the Interplay Between Medical and Non-medical Cannabis in Chronic Pain Management.

    • Claudie Audet, Christian Bertrand, Marc O Martel, Anne Marie Pinard, Mélanie Bérubé, and Anaïs Lacasse.
    • Département des sciences de la santé, Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue (UQAT), Rouyn-Noranda, Québec, Canada.
    • Clin J Pain. 2024 Aug 28; 40 (11): 635645635-45.

    ObjectivesCannabis is used by one-third of people living with chronic pain to alleviate their symptoms despite warnings from several organizations regarding its efficacy and safety. We currently know little about self-medication practices (use of cannabis for therapeutic purposes without guidance), mainly since the legalization of recreational cannabis in countries such as Canada has expanded the scope of this phenomenon. This study aimed to describe legal cannabis self-medication for pain relief in people living with chronic pain and to explore perceptions of the effectiveness and safety of cannabis.MethodsA cross-sectional descriptive study was performed among 73 individuals living with chronic pain and using cannabis (Quebec, Canada). Data collection using telephone interviews occurred in early 2023.ResultsResults indicated that 61.6% of participants reported using cannabis without the guidance of a healthcare professional (self-medication). Surprisingly, among those, 40.0% held a medical authorization. Overall, 20.6% of study participants were using both medical and legal non-medical cannabis. Different pathways to self-medication were revealed. Proportion of women vs. men participants self-medicating were 58.2% vs. 70.6% (P=0.284). In terms of perceptions, 90.4% of the sample perceived cannabis to be effective for pain management; 72.6% estimated that it posed no or minimal health risk.DiscussionCannabis research is often organized around medical vs. non-medical cannabis but in the real-world, those two vessels are connected. Interested parties, including researchers, healthcare professionals and funding agencies, need to consider this. Patients using cannabis feel confident in the safety of cannabis, and many of them self-medicate, which calls for action.Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.

      Pubmed     Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…