How has CBD been tested so far?

Everyone knows that CBD is helpful, but not everyone knows how it has been tested in order to determine this.  The FDA has not officially approved CBD; however, they have approved further testing for the compound, due to the fact that it has shown promising potential for a medical substance.  CBD has shown that it could be therapeutically useful as an anti-seizure, antioxidant, neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, anti-tumor, anti-psychotic, and anti-anxiety, so, the FDA has determined that more research would be useful to society.  Recently the DEA has eased up on some of their laws and restrictions when it comes to the research of THC and CBD.  Because they have done this, and are now working with the FDA instead of against them, CBD can now be tested further. 

Anti-seizure medication, maybe

The FDA just recently approved further testing for CBD, since it has shown it can be used for a number of issues.  One of the issues it has shown to be helpful for is seizures.  There have been studies performed over the last two decades that have reported that CBD has anti-seizure activity, reducing the severity of seizures in animal models, but has never been approved for human testing.  Through animal testing, CBD has shown to be effective for easing seizures for a number of patients, including epileptics.  Three of the four studies showed positive results, including decreased frequency of seizures; however, the studies suffered from major design problems, including issues with fully quantifying baseline seizure frequency, improper statistical analysis, and a lack of detail to properly evaluate and interpret the results.  Unfortunately, this means information is insufficient to form conclusions when it comes to the way CBD works as a treatment for epilepsy. 

Neuroprotective and anti-inflammatory effects, possibly

Studies have shown that CBD has promising potential, and shows neuroprotective properties in cell cultures, as well as in animal models of several neurodegenerative diseases; including Alzheimer’s, stroke, glutamate toxicity, multiple sclerosis (MS), Parkinson’s Disease, and neurodegeneration caused by alcohol abuse.  There have been limited clinical trials, due to the FDA and DEA restrictions, to assess the potential uses of CBD for the other issues presented. There was even a recent, small trial in patients with Parkinson’s disease that found that  could CBD mildly improve quality-of-life scores.  CBD has also shown anti-inflammatory properties, which aide its neuroprotective properties.

Analgesic, maybe partially

CBD has been shown to be helpful in helping with chronic and severe pain, but it is more effective if it is used with THC.  THC is the ingredient that is the active pain reliever, but research does show that it is also more effective if CBD is involved.  So, while both ingredients together help with relieving pain, both separately may also help slightly with mild pain.  Further research is needed to determine whether one or both may be helpful in the use of acute pain relief. 

Anti-tumor, sure

There have been studies that have found reduced cancer cell viability, increased cancer cell death, decreased tumor growth, and inhibition of metastasis when researching cancer and CBD.  This has only been found in animal patients and has not been fully tested in human patients at all, These effects may be due to the fact that CBD is an anti-inflammatory, but now that the FDA and DEA has approved some testing, we may be able to find this out for sure.

Anti-psychotic, could be

There have been a few trials that patients with psychotic symptoms were treated with CBD, including cases where patients that had schizophrenia reported conflicting results.  There was also a small case study in which patients with Parkinson’s disease who had psychosis reported good results; and one small randomized clinical trial reported improvement in patients with schizophrenia.  Unfortunately, these trials were too small, too conflicting, and not regulated.  Fortunately, they provided enough information that the FDA decided that CBD was worth further examination for anti-psychotic uses.

Anti-anxiety, why not

While THC has been noted to increase anxiety issues, CBD has shown to help them.  CBD has shown some great success in the area of animal anxiety.  Fortunately, stress and anxiety is the one thing that has been tested by humans, and it has shown some great success in humans as well.  CBD has also been shown to help in Post-Traumatic stress disorder as it helps to make a person forget traumatic memories.  CBD has also had very great success when given to dogs to aide separation anxiety.  CBD has had the most success with anxiety, and this was just too much for the FDA to ignore.

Go FDA, finally

It is great that the FDA is finally allowing CBD to be tested like it should be.  It has been made plenty obvious that CBD has medical benefits, it is up to researchers to prove it.  Hopefully now that the FDA and DEA have regulations that are slightly more lax compared to what they used to be, more people will be okay testing the effects of CBD on humans.