Schizophrenia and Cannabis

[restin]

Hello Psychonauts,

I sometimes talk with my parents about cannabis, and I like to show them the medical advantages of cannabis...My father, on the other hand underlines the triggering of schizophrenia by cannabis. He is psychiatrists so he should be a reliable source of knowledge.

This is the situation.

Now I want to ask my fellow psychonauts of such effect of cannabis is well-known. I´ve head about the possible trigger of schizophrenia but I had in mind that this happened very rarely.

What is your knowledge about it?

 

[GOD]

The first question is do other drugs have a statistical conection to the outbreak of schizophrenia ? For instance most schitzophrenics have drunken alcohol .

The second is are the statistical conections bigger for cannabis or other drugs ?

The third is are people with latent schitziphrenia atracted to taking cannabis ?

Untill those questions are answered the theory of cannabis triggering latent schitzophrenia is pure propoganda .

 

[druglessdouglas]

well, people with mental illness tend to self medicate. cannabis is easy to get and relatively inexpensive so many choose to use it, therefor many schizophrenics use cannabis.

i do know personally perhaps 6 schizophrenics who either avoid cannabis or in my opinion should. it definitely brings on the worse of their symptoms.

i doubt it was the cause of their disease though, and i know 3 were quite ill before they ever had a smoke.

anecdotal yes, but the point is if the gene/genes are present for schizophrenia the condition can be triggered by anything. falling off a bicycle, a death in the family, a bad case of the flu virus, practically anything.

 

[GOD]

A few other thoughts for your dad.......

Does it trigger a schitzophrene episode or a full blown schitzophrenia ? Is the schitzophrenia long term ? Is it cureable ? Could it be that the trigger is not the cannabis but the guilt complex that is drilled into us by schools , churches and the media ? Would the ocurance of the outbreak of latent schitzophrenia in cannabis users be prevented by legalisation and proper education , especialy safe use education ? And instead of looking for things to blame wouldnt it be better to do something about the fact that up to 38% of the population has a latent schitzophrenia ?

I`d realy love to hear his answers .

 

[GOD]

More thoughts....

Has the type of cannabis anything to do with any possible problems ? I mean indoor , outdoor , commercial "hash" or real hash .

All the people i know who have had problems had been smoking indoor grass or big quantitys of comercial "hash" . I`ve never heard of anyone who smoked real grass or hash having problems .

The english study that said it found a statistical connection between cannabis specificaly said they were talking about indoor grown grass since 1990 . They were also talking about smoking it .

 

[Maru]

Also statistics about schizophrenia and cannabis are mostly based on young people. Nobody can know if those people would not have revealed a schizo later anyway.

 

[random]

Some months ago I remember watching a documentary on the Tv that actually said, by a french psychologist (if im not mistaken), cannabis could help schizophrenic people to apreciate reality in a more normal way and with less symptoms.
They didnt tell how it was putted into the body, by those patients.

I guess a lot of research has to be done. And I think this shouldn't be discussed by sterotypes. Each case, is a case, like many other themes.

 

[????????]

show your dad GOD's posts

 

[GOD]

There is a proffessor in hamburg called Dr. Rainer Thomasius . He did some "Studys" and said they proved that cannabis triggered latent psychosies . It was all over the press in germany . If your dad mentions them please tell him that a german health minister said publicaly that the studys were "unserious" ( unserious und nicht ernst zu nehmen ) .

He did an extacy study to . It was finished and i went to him and told him a load of lies about the problems that extacy had caused me . He was going to call the study back so he could put my story in it . Thats how objective he is .

 

[restin]

thanks a lot, I will consider your posts,especially thanks to GOD

 

[Forkbender]

There's a book called Understanding Marijuana which really sums up the scientific studies around this and other related issues very well and comes to similar conclusions/questions/doubts that GOD has put forward in this thread. It is by Mitch Earleywine and published by Oxford University Press (!), a very notable publisher.

 

[restin]

Very interesting, is it new resp. up-to-date?

 

[Forkbender]

2002. It's an overview of pretty much all marijuana research in history up until then.

 

[dbieon12]

To throw my two-cents into this discussion:

I think that cannabis has triggered in some ways my schizophrenia although I have never been 'diagnosed' with it by a professional... (not to sound like a hypochondriac)

Reading more and more about it, it really seems that I do 'suffer' from it...

But I agree that cannabis may help 'trigger' it but schizophrenia is something that the victim will typically have to overcome at some point in their lifetime, with or without cannabis triggering it.

The problem is relating Schizophrenia to the use of cannabis, so many other things could have triggered it, especially the use of other drugs.

PS: I should add that I really have no idea as to when my Schizophrenia may have started.

2¢

 

[druglessdouglas]

at least you have a degree of self awareness dbieon12 concerning your mind state. do you have "episodes" where you are lost or a daily and/or constant self conflict?

 

[Psyolopher]

Is there any direct evidence for that?
Or does your daddy enjoy pseudo science such as psychology?

 

[restin]

Don't paint your walls black and white.

He is a psychiatrist.

You may hate this job. But you still must see, that it really helps a lot of people, especially those with suicidal tendencies. Many are cured. THe fact that some don't doesn't mean that the job is futile. Do you know how many chirurgists had to see their patients die? Do you want to kill them all?

My two cents:

If you want love, you must give. YOu complain that the others only bring you hate and ignorance towards you and your drugs. At the same time you attack a 17yo (other threat), smokers and professions you expect understanding from.

 

[st.bot.32]

the thing is, millions of people do cannabis all the time.

by the very nature of the job, a psychiatrist is only going to meet the problem cases and not the other 99% of users who don't have a problem.

 

[Psyolopher]

the thing is, millions of people do cannabis all the time.

by the very nature of the job, a psychiatrist is only going to meet the problem cases and not the other 99% of users who don't have a problem.

Good point!

 

[poisoninthestain]

i know a guy personally who is schizo and he says cannabis helps him A LOT with his symptoms. I mean A LOT.

that's just my 2 cents.