University of New Mexico Study Finds Benefits from Medical Marijuana

A study conducted at the University of New Mexico found that people that use medical marijuana instead of prescription pills find better relief. At the end of August, New Mexico had nearly 47,000 patients in its medical marijuana program. The three top-enrolled qualifying conditions include PTSD, severe chronic pain and cancer.

PTSD has the most enrollees with 19,234 according to KOB 4 News.  The study compared those still using prescription painkillers to those who use medical marijuana just in New Mexico. According to researchers, medical marijuana may become a more prevalent choice for those on prescription opioids.

Researcher Dr. Jacob Miguel Vigil said, “They actually reduced and in many cases eliminated the use of broad classes of prescription medications beyond opiates alone.”

Vigil also said, “Prescription opioids, for example, and cannabis are scheduled drugs. One can make the argument that patients might not be better off in switching to another scheduled drug. However, we do know that long-term opioid use is not effective at treating chronic pain. Certainly, opioids tend to lead to a lot of harm and threats to our society.”

Vigil has received permission to conduct a larger study involving thousands of patients to take this research to the next step.