Marijuana just got more medicinal with the report in New Scientist that: Cannabis extract shrinks brain tumours
The article also notes that the research has gone beyond the ‘lab rat” stage and has been shown to be effective in slowing glioblastoma multiforme.
“An active component of the street drug has previously been shown to improve brain tumours in rats. But now Manuel Guzmn at Complutense University, Spain, and colleagues have demonstrated how the cannabis extracts block a key chemical needed for tumours to sprout blood vessels – a process called angiogenesis.
“And for the first time, the team has shown the cannabinoids impede this chemical in people with the most aggressive form of brain cancer – glioblastoma multiforme.
“Cristina Blzquez at Complutense University, and one of the team, stresses the results are preliminary. ‘But it’s a good point to start and continue,’ she told New Scientist.
‘The cannabinoid inhibits the angiogenesis response – if a tumour doesn’t do angiogenesis, it doesn’t grow,’ she explains. ‘So if you can improve angiogenesis on one side and kill the tumour cells on the other side, you can try for a therapy for cancer.’
I’d write some commentary to this amazing dishcovery but dude my therapy is…….. yeah…… kicking….. in…… and… you ever notice, I mean did you rever really, like, look at a pencil?
and elbow-nudging aside, I have a dear friend who has brain tumors and is in desperate need of this information. Thanks so much for posting it.
treats drug use rather lightly and hides several facts. Smoking marijuana exposes one to a wide variety of chemicals, some of which might inhibit the effects of the compound used in the study, and some of which may promote their own cases of cancer. The compound, delta-9-THC, was applied directly to the tumor, so one should replace the image of a drugged-out bong smoker with someone in an operating room, their skull split open and the drug applied with a needle and syringe right into the brain. Crude marijuana may have some use treating nausea and appetite suppression, but should not be considered as a way to shrink tumors.
… and can distinguish between the frame and the content, thank you.
We also assume that if you can find sciscoop and read it you can understand that nobody is trepaning the skull and packing it with wads of fresh bud. That’s what the “extract” word indicates.
Those who feel compelled to *always* schoolmarm-up should seek employment in the many elementary educational institutions that have a crying need for same.
In fact, I’m due to visit him soon at the place where he’s been institutionalized.
His trouble started long ago, though so all this is academic to him.
I’m sure I don’t have to tell you this, but explore all treatments, ALL TREATMENTS, as soon as possible.
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…vanderleun, one would assume the “average” SciScoop reader would see the obvious as well as have a sense of humor. However, to use the word “average” implies that there are those above “average” and those below “average”. Have a little tolerance, eh…? :)
I am reminded of the “scientists” during the Renaissance who clung to the church-professed or traditional beliefs in spite of evidence to the contrary (Galileo’s discoveries come to mind). Pushing the truth past one’s fears and beliefs isn’t easy — what’s even more deplorable is the person who knows what is true but promotes something else for economic, peer pressure, or even reasons of pride (to change what they’ve taught or written would be “embarrassing”). Darwin’s work of 150 years ago, the “Scope’s Monkey Trial” in the 20’s, or work on cold fusion are more recent examples.
Good work, vanderleun. There’s useful information in the article if — to paraphrase gypsysoul — you push all that “eye-winking and elbow-nudging aside”. Or to paraphrase rickyjames, a compelling headline can entice SciScoop readers to check out what they might have overlooked.
jon
We assume most are not humor impaired and can distinguish between the frame and the content.”
It’s the poorly written content that I have a problem with. Nowhere in the story is there a mention of the rather alarming method of application, and the word “extract” isn’t sufficient. Even an intelligent person could be left with the impression that the patients are happily swilling the extract out of a martini glass, swallowing it in a tiny capsule, applying it using a transdermal patch, or even smoking it (hash oil is a crude marijuana extract, after all). To be fair, the original Newscientist article itself was badly written.
a close reading of the article in the New Scientist would direct you to the original and peer-reviewed journal Cancer Research for a more detailed and less colorful account. You could also, if you had a mind, track down the scientist quoted and correspond via email or snail mail as well as phone.
Nothing keeps you from doing your own research and reporting.
in one three word phrase: “is slowing gliobastoma.” Should read “in slowing glioblastoma.” Perhaps the author was high. Ha ha.
“Multiforme“, not “multiforma.”