Medical Marijuana to Treat Bipolar Disorder?

An article published in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs suggests that marijuana may be a useful treatment for bipolar disorder, which affects approximately 5.7 million adult Americans every year.  Because marijuana is a schedule 1 drug (same category as heroin), it is extremely difficult to get research approval.  Some patients with bipolar disorder use marijuana to treat both depression and mania, two symptoms of bipolar disorder. 

While there have been no formal studies on using marijuana to treat bipolar disorder,  a 2012 study suggests that patients with bipolar disorder who had past use of marijuana exhibited better neurocognitive performance than patients who had no past use marijuana.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that marijuana is effective at treating many of the symptoms of bipolar disorder, and the authors of this article call for more research to be done. 

Abstract:

    The authors present case histories indicating that a number of patients find cannabis (marihuana) useful in the treatment of their bipolar disorder. Some used it to treat mania, depression, or both. They stated that it was more effective than conventional drugs, or helped relieve the side effects of those drugs. One woman found that cannabis curbed her manic rages; she and her husband have worked to make it legally available as a medicine. Others described the use of cannabis as a supplement to lithium (allowing reduced consumption) or for relief of lithium’s side effects. Another case illustrates the fact that medical cannabis users are in danger of arrest, especially when children are encouraged to inform on parents by some drug prevention programs. An analogy is drawn between the status of cannabis today and that of lithium in the early 1950s, when its effect on mania had been discovered but there were no controlled studies. In the case of cannabis, the law has made such studies almost impossible, and the only available evidence is anecdotal. The potential for cannabis as a treatment for bipolar disorder unfortunately can not be fully explored in the present social circumstances.
Click here to read the full article: The use of cannabis as a mood stabilizer in bipolar disorder: anecdotal evidence and the need for clinical research.