A recent meta-analysis published last week in Frontiers of Oncology found that medical cannabis has the potential to help treat symptoms of cancer. The study, which pulled from prior cannabis research, was the largest-ever analysis to investigate the interplay of cannabis and cancer, and researchers found a “significant majority” of the relevant studies fell predominantly in favor of medical cannabis use, The Guardian reports.
Funded by the group Cancer Playbook, researchers utilized an AI-powered processing technique called “sentiment analysis” to conduct the meta-analysis, which surveyed over 10,000 studies into medical cannabis and cancer.
Ryan Castle, research director at Whole Health Oncology Institute and the study’s lead author, said the goal was to push for a consensus on medical cannabis as a potential cancer treatment.
“Our goal was to determine the scientific consensus on the topic of medical cannabis, a field that has long been dominated by a war between cherrypicked studies.” — Castle, via The Guardian
Castle said the team was expecting “a moderate consensus” about the potential of cannabis as a cancer treatment, but that the actual results were closer to three-to-one in favor of cannabis as an effective medical treatment for cancer-related inflammation, appetite loss, and nausea, according to the report.
“That’s a shocking degree of consensus in public health research, and certainly more than we were anticipating for a topic as controversial as medical cannabis,” Castle said.
Get daily cannabis business news updates. Subscribe
End