A new study out of Ohio finds that a large majority of medical marijuana patients in the state say cannabis has reduced their use of prescription opioid painkillers as well as other, illicit drugs.

The survey of approximately 3,500 people—which was sent to state medical marijuana patients and caregivers through the Ohio Department of Commerce as well as shared online through social media—found that 77.5 percent agreed that marijuana reduced their need to use prescription painkillers. As for illicit drugs, 26.8 percent of respondents reported a diminished need to use.

Meanwhile, only small percentages of people disagreed that marijuana reduced their need to use prescription painkillers (1.7 percent) or illegal drugs (1.9 percent).

“Our results and those of previous studies display encouraging results about the potential benefits of using marijuana to reduce the use of painkillers and other illegal drugs,” says the new report, published as a preprint this month by Ohio State University law school’s Drug Enforcement and Policy Center.

“A large majority of respondents agreed that using marijuana reduced their use of prescription painkillers.”

Notably, those who used cannabis daily “were more likely to agree that using marijuana reduced their need to use prescription painkillers compared to those who used marijuana less than daily (daily = 80.54%, not daily = 70.14%),” wrote author Pete Leasure, a senior research associate at the Drug Enforcement and Policy Center.

Similar results were found regarding other illegal drug use. About 30.6 percent of daily cannabis users said marijuana reduced their need to use illicit drugs compared to about 17.5 percent of less-than-daily users.

The study acknowledges that given the non-random sampling method used, the data “may not be representative of all marijuana users (medical or non-medical).” But it nevertheless considers the results to point toward certain policy changes aimed at reducing overall harm.

“Several policy implications should be mentioned in light of these findings,” the report says. “First, if Ohio probation and parole offices include a prohibition of marijuana use for individuals with a history of opioid use, those offices may want to consider weighing the costs and benefits of removing those prohibitions (and thus any potential technical violations).”

“For evidence-based support, researchers could encourage probation and parole offices to assist with randomized controlled trials where some individuals are assigned to a marijuana prohibition and others are not assigned a marijuana prohibition,” the study suggests. “The success of either assignment could be judged by examining outcomes such as other drug use, technical violations, and or new crime commission.”

The report also notes some research showing that marijuana is associated with some negative health impacts.

“Therefore, even if more rigorous studies show that marijuana use reduces the use of prescription painkillers and other illegal drugs, more research will be needed to determine the efficacy of marijuana versus other treatments,” it says.

Moving marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III of the federal Controlled Substances Act, Leasure notes, would make robust research “easier to conduct” and help reduce obstacles to conducting experimental trials.

The findings further the idea of a substitution effect whereby patients opt for cannabis instead of opioids or other drugs to treat pain, though nuances of the effect are still poorly understood.

Separate research published earlier this year that looked at opioid prescription and mortality rates in Oregon, for instance, found that nearby access to retail marijuana moderately reduced opioid prescriptions, though there was no corresponding drop in opioid-related deaths.

“We cannot know for sure why we see a reduction in prescription opioid use and not a mortality effect given our data constraints,” authors of that study told Marijuana Moment in an email about the report, “but a potential explanation could be that either the substitution effect is not large enough, or possibly, those who are most likely to succumb to opioid misuse are not making this particular substitution.”

Another report published recently in the journal BMJ Open compared medical marijuana and opioids for chronic non-cancer pain and found that cannabis “may be similarly effective and result in fewer discontinuations than opioids,” potentially offering comparable relief with a lower likelihood of adverse effects.

And federally funded study published in May concluded that even some cannabis terpenes may have pain-relieving effects. That research found that an injected dose of the compounds produced a “roughly equal” reduction in pain markers in mice when compared to a smaller dose of morphine. Terpenes also appeared to enhance the efficacy of morphine in mice when the two drugs were given in combination.

Another study, published late last year, found that marijuana and opioids were “equally efficacious” at mitigating pain intensity, but cannabis also provided more “holistic” relief, such as by improving sleep, focus and emotional wellbeing.

The same month, research published in the Journal of Dental Research found that pure CBD could alleviate acute dental pain about as well as an opioid formula commonly used in dentistry.

A study published last summer linked medical marijuana use to lower pain levels and reduced dependence on opioids and other prescription medications. Another, published by the American Medical Association (AMA) in February, found that chronic pain patients who received medical marijuana for longer than a month saw significant reductions in prescribed opioids.

About one in three chronic pain patients reported using cannabis as a treatment option, according to another AMA-published report last year. Most of that group said they used cannabis as a substitute for other pain medications, including opioids.

Other research published last year found that letting people buy CBD legally significantly reduced opioid prescription rates, leading to 6.6 percent to 8.1 percent fewer opioid prescriptions.

A 2022 research paper that analyzed Medicaid data on prescription drugs, meanwhile, found that legalizing marijuana for adult use was associated with “significant reductions” in the use of prescription drugs for the treatment of multiple conditions.

Source: Ben Adlin – marijuanamoment.net