Marijuana Kills Cancer Cells?

[TXteacher]

I've read some scientific and a lot of anecdotal info claiming marijuana kills tumor cells. Has anyone experimented with this or gained any medical benefit from marijuana use?

cancer.gov/about-cancer/tre...

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator]

Marijuana compounds have been shown to synergistically assist standard treatment in laboratory testing for an acute leukaemia, which has been posted about several times here. When it comes to CLL, a chronic blood cancer, there doesn't appear to be any good evidence of a worthwhile effect on tackling the cancerous cells. There is reasonably good evidence that for some of us, cannabinoids can provide anti nausea and pain relief where other medications aren't effective.

For something to be active against a cancerous cell and not other body cells, the cancerous cell needs to have more receptors to the substance than other cells (over expressed is the term). Further, when the receptors are triggered by the substance, there needs to be some inhibition of cell activity - ideally a triggering apoptosis - cell death. That hasn't been observed in CLL.

Check out the references about marijuana in the reply to this post:

healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

Neil

[Jm954 Administrator]

Never tried it and I don't know anyone who has. Personally, I think I'd be too worried about the risk of inducing psychosis.

[dsspivak2018 in reply to Jm954]

Try CBD oil. Has all the positive benefits of marijuana and very, very low THC, like 0.3%. Not enough to feel anything, but enough to help the canniboids to work even better.

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator in reply to dsspivak2018]

Problem is - as with any herbal remedies/supplements, that you need a reputable supplier: healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

While Table 1 of the source report (the full report requires a payment) shows CBD oil as the most accurately labeled product, there is still a significant range in concentration, with only 45% of the samples within 10% of the stated concentration: jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...

[Swissnology]

I've been smoking for 30 years I still have CLL so now it's not true

[TXteacher in reply to Swissnology]

Sorry. That's good Info. No corresponding reduction in your WBC either?

[PlanetaryKim in reply to Swissnology]

The medicinal value of cannabinoids for suppressing/killing cancer is destroyed when smoked due to temperatures involved in smoking/burning it. For cancer it needs to be prepared/distilled into oil and then consumed orally or topically or as suppository. So, smoking pot may make you feel better if you have cancer, but it has zero effect on killing/suppressing cancer. Must go with oil in some form for that.

kim

[Swissnology]

No, there may be a cannabis oil in the future that helps but there is nothing right now supposedly high-potency vitamin C everyday I'm taking 2000 mg stops the protein that attacks the Beast cell so who knows

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator in reply to Swissnology]

Vitamin C treatment of cancer has had a checkered history. Recent research indicates that the reason for this is that we haven't been assessing which cancer types are susceptible to vitamin C, with the reason for positive trial results not being understood and being drowned out by lack of results in the vast majority of trials. With CLL, per this previous post

healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo... it appears that we'd need to have a rare in CLL TET2 mutation for high concentrations of vitamin C to have any effect. Challengingly, CLL is a very heterogeneous disease, so what works for some of us won't necessarily work for the majority.

Neil