dranabinol act to free up dopamine and
decrease the overstimulation of the midbrain.
The results in treating ADHD with cannabis
are often spectacular.
Patients report grades going from Cs and Ds
to As and Bs. Dr. David Bearman, a physician
practicing in Santa Barbara, California,
reports patients have said, “I graduated from
the Maritime Academy because I smoked
marijuana,” and “I got my Ph.D. because of
smoking marijuana.” Almost universally,
ADHD patients who therapeutically used
cannabis reported it helped them pay attention
in lecture, focus their attention instead of
thinking of several ideas almost at the same
time, helped them to stay on task and do their
homework.
Typical
ADHD
symptoms
include
distractibility. The most accepted theory
about ADHD rests on the fact that about 70%
of the brain’s function is to regulate input to
the other 30%. The cause of ADHD is
probably a decreased ability to suppress
sensory input both internal and external input
Basically the brain is overwhelmed with too
much information that comes too fast.
In ADHD, the brain is cluttered with, and too
aware of, all the nuances of a person’s daily
experience. This phenomenon is caused by a
dopamine dysfunction.
Since the endocannabinoid system was
discovered, many studies revealed that
marijuana also modulates the dopamine
system and therefore has a potential for
ADHD treatment.
As recounted in the physicians’ stories below,
marijuana may be a safer, less costly, and
more effective treatment than anything
available from the pharmaceutical companies.
Dr. Claudia Jensen, a 49-year old California
paediatrician and mother of 2 teenage
daughters, says marijuana might be the best
treatment for ADHD. In an interview with the
FOD news network, she said:
“Why would anyone want to give their child
an expensive pill… with unacceptable side
effects, when he or she could just go into the
backyard, pick a few leaves off a plant and
make tea…?”
“Cannabinoids are a very viable alternative to
treating adolescents with ADD and ADHD …
I have a lot of adult patients who swear by it.”
In her testimony, before the House Committee
on Government Reform on Marijuana (2004)
Dr. Jensen discussed the practice of
recommending marijuana to patients with
ADHD in an 11-page statement.
Her testimony summarised hundreds of
published scientific articles on the
safety/efficacy of marijuana that have
produced strong scientific evidence that
marijuana is an important medicine.
Her reasons for looking to marijuana as
treatment for ADHD?
“The other legal drugs used to treat ADD are
helpful in many patients, but they all have side
effects… the other five of the nine drugs used
to treat ADD in this country haven’t even
been scientifically tested … for ADD in
children.
These are drugs for depression and high blood
pressure … Of all the drug’s used to treat
ADD, cannabis has the least number of
serious side effects.”
Her explanation for why marijuana is opposed
by the pharmaceutical companies:
“The real problem with allowing patients to
use cannabis as a medication is economics …
If cannabis were approved for use in just the
ADD/ADHD market alone, it could
significantly impact the $1 billion a year sales
for traditional ADD/ADHD
pharmaceuticals.”
https://www.preventdisease.com/news/14/05
1214_5-Diseases-Proven-To-Respond-
Better-To-Cannabis-Than-Prescription-
Drugs.shtml