Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a type of anxiety disorder that’s triggered by a traumatic event that involved the threat of injury or death. Post-traumatic stress disorder can develop after someone experiences or witnesses an event that causes intense fear, helplessness or horror.

Many people who are involved in traumatic events have a brief period of difficulty adjusting and coping, after which they improve and get better. In some cases, though, the symptoms can get worse or last for months or even years. Symptoms can sometimes interfere with normal functioning, sleeping, and interpersonal relationships.  This is often when the diagnosis of PTSD is made.

Three groups of symptoms are required in order to make the diagnosis of PTSD:  (1) recurring re-experiencing of the traumatic event (troublesome memories, flashbacks, nightmares); (2) avoidance to the point of having phobias of places, people, and experiences that are reminders of the traumatic event and (3) chronic physical signs of hyperarousal, such as insomnia, trouble concentrating, irritability, anger, blackouts, and difficulty remembering things.  PTSD sufferers often have emotional numbing that manifests as difficulty enjoying activities that they previously enjoyed, inability to look forward to future plans, and emotional distancing from loved ones.

Conventional treatment for PTSD includes psychotherapy, learning coping skills, and family counseling.  Medications such as anti-depressants, mood stabilizers, sleep aids, and anti-anxiety medicines are often prescribed.  Some patients find relief with these treatments but it is well known in the medical community that PTSD is difficult to treat.

Cannabis has been used by many PTSD sufferers with good results, especially for insomnia and anxiety.  Cannabis can give PTSD patients a sense of well-being and serenity, and it allows them to continue to function with little to no adverse side effects.  There are a number of researchers currently exploring the science behind the use of  cannabis for treatment of PTSD and the results are promising.  For now, PTSD patients that live in states where medical use of cannabis is legal can use it to help decrease the debilitating symptoms of their illness.

Tourette’s Syndrome (TS) is a complex neuropsychiatric disorder that is characterized by involuntary tics.  The cause of this disorder is unknown.  Some patients with TS have small tics and others have debilitating tics.  It is estimated that there are 100,000 Americans with TS.  There is no known cure for TS but it is reported to improve with age.

A number of studies since 1999 have shown that TS patients have an improvement in tics and in other associated behaviors (such as obsessive-compulsive behaviors) with use of THC, the main natural medicinal compound in cannabis, and no cognitive impairment was noted.

In 2003, the previous findings were confirmed with another well-designed study that was published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.  In this study, TS patients received either THC or placebo for six weeks and scored the level of daily tics.  Patients who were receiving THC had significant reduction of the tics and suffered no detrimental effects on learning, recall, or verbal memory.  Researchers concluded that for adult TS patients, “Therapy with delta-9-THC should be tried…”.  For those patients who have not found relief from symptoms with conventional therapy, who have adverse side effects from current treatment, or who prefer a natural treatment, medical cannabis is a viable  and reasonable alternative.

Sleep apnea is a medical condition characterized by frequent interruptions in breathing of up to 10 second or more during sleep.  There are three types of sleep apnea:  obstructive, central and mixed.  Obstructive sleep apnea is the most common type and is cased by a blockage of the airway, usually when the soft tissue in the rear of the throat collapses and closes during sleep.  This type of sleep apnea is associated with obesity.  With central sleep apnea, the airway is open, not blocked, but the brain fails to tell the muscles to breathe.  Mixed sleep apnea is when a person suffers from both obstructive and central sleep apnea.

With each apnea episode, the brain usually arouses the person with sleep apnea in order for them to start breathing again.  But this type of pattern results in disrupted sleep that is of poor quality.

Sleep apnea is estimated to occur in about 4% of men and 2% of women between the ages of 30 and 60.  The condition is associated with other disorders such as chronic headaches, high blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, heart attacks, strokes, and fatigue.

Doctors diagnose sleep apnea based on medical and family histories, a physical exam, and results from tests called sleep studies.  Usually, your primary care doctor evaluates your symptoms first. He or she then decides whether you need to see a sleep specialist.  Conventional therapy includes lifestyle changes (avoiding alcohol, losing weight, changing sleep position, quitting tobacco use), use of a mouthpiece that keeps the airway open during sleep, use of a positive airway pressure machine that one wears during sleep (CPAP), and sometimes surgery to make the airway larger or remove tonsils.

In the June issue of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine journal, scientists at the University of Illinois Department of Medicine reported that sleep apnea in rats that received cannabinoids (the natural chemicals in cannabis) was suppressed. Doses of delta-9-THC and oleamide stabilized breathing during sleep and blocked serotonin-induced worsening of the sleep apnea.  Many patients who have used medical cannabis report improved sleep quality and less fatigue the following day.  It is not known if the problems associated with sleep apnea (such as high blood pressure, heart attacks, irregular heartbeats, etc.) are affected by cannabis use and further studies are warranted to examine these issues.

i1] Investigators reported that doses of delta-9-THC and the endocannabinoid oleamide each stabilized respiration during sleep, and blocked serotonin-induced exacerbation of sleep apnea in a statistically significant manner. No follow up investigations have taken place assessing the use of cannabinoids to treat this indication. However, several recent preclinical and clinical trials have reported on the use of THC, natural cannabis extracts, and endocannabinoids to induce sleep[2,3] and/or improve sleep quality.