Many patients who are being treated for opioid addiction in a medication-assisted treatment clinic use marijuana to help manage their pain and mood symptoms.
But new research led by Marian Wilson, Ph.D., of the Washington State University College of Nursing found that frequent marijuana use seems to strengthen the relationship between pain and depression and anxiety, not ease it.
“For people who are using cannabis the most, they have a very strong relationship between pain and mood symptoms, and that’s not necessarily the pattern you’d want to see,” Wilson said. “You would hope, if cannabis is helpful, the more they use it the fewer symptoms they’d see.”
The research, recently published in the journal Addictive Behaviors, involved 150…