Notes From The Innovative: Israeli Researcher Dedi Meiri On Cannabis, Alzheimer’s And Dementia

I just recently listened to a webinar where David (Dedi) Meiri discussed the marijuana research in his lab at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. Meiri is best understood for his work matching particular components of marijuana to affect various kinds of cancer. When the recruiter asked the Israeli scientist which locations of medication he believed marijuana provided the most promise, the answer was surprising.

On top of what is already understood and treated … pain, sleep, epilepsy, anxiety and these examples, I think that a person of the important things that is still not being treated with marijuana … and I truly, truly believe in it, and in my laboratory I have extraordinary results, is dementia and Alzheimer’s.

There is a large and growing body of anecdotal accounts of the efficacy of marijuana for dealing with the symptoms of Alzheimer’s illness and dementia. The imperfections and actual lethal threats associated with standard and frequently prescribed pharmaceutical treatments for these conditions makes cannabis a particularly compelling choice– particularly considering its strong security profile.

In a follow up Zoom call, Dedi spoke about his deal with this topic:

First of all, marijuana is really beneficial in improving quality of life: minimizing stress and anxiety, enhancing sleep, decreasing violence.

If we’re talking about enhancing quality of life of the Alzheimer’s client and their households … people with Alzheimer’s often suffer from bursts of anger and sleep conditions. On that scale marijuana is extremely useful …

But Meiri also points out that for Alzheimer’s disease, like with cancer, marijuana may also have a function beyond palliative care. Just as his lab looks at the various chemovars and mixes of cannabinoids that can potentially detain cancer advancement, they are investigating the neuroprotective performance of these substances.

With Alzheimer’s, on top of all the palliative treatment on the quality of life, there is a question whether marijuana can also really battle the dementia or improve the memory or the pathology of the illness itself. There are currently a couple of research studies that have actually shown that marijuana in low dosages can be effective. It’s known that the endocannabinoid system is involved in this procedure and in the development of Alzheimer’s. Decrease of Anandamide and 2AG and other endocannabinoids is in line with the progression of the disease.

Over the last 3 years, Meiri has been pursuing this line of research study using mouse and other Alzheimer’s illness designs.

We evaluated a lot of marijuana chemovars and defined a few that are decreasing the amyloid plaques in the brain. We also recognized the systems that are triggered in the brain, how this occurs, and why they are minimizing the plaques. We have very strong outcomes revealing improvement in the pathology of the disease in mice with quite advanced Alzheimer’s after treatment with specific particles of cannabis. This consists of improvements in the damage from the amyloid plaques in the brain and the nerve cells that were treated with the particular cannabis particles, in addition to improvement in their behavior as evidenced through different tests.

Nevertheless, there is a big gap in between the mice brain and the human brain, so I couldn’t inform you if it will work in human patients …

To get rid of that gap, Meiri and his group are now in the procedure of getting approvals for a scientific trial to test the effects of a complete spectrum cannabis extract on patients.

It’s a clinical trial on around 80 patients who experience severe Alzheimer’s disease, with violent behavior, anxiety, anger and sleep disorders. We will treat them with cannabis to see if it can improve their habits, make them calmer, more relaxed and assist them sleep much better. This is marijuana with a very low amount of THC or without THC at all– a whole extract of a high CBD stress. It’s not just sedation – you don’t give them THC and get them stoned and they’re just lying on the sofa. It’s not that. It’s other compounds and other impacts.

We also spoke about the essential subtleties between marijuana cultivars, and the need of looking beyond just THC and CBD.

We have cultivars that are improving an illness significantly, and we have cultivars that make the illness even worse, even though they have the very same quantity of CBD and THC. It’s true for sleep disorders, numerous sclerosis, in Alzheimer’s and with a cancer.

If that holds true, then what about all the cannabis medicines that are simply made up of THC and CBD isolates in different ratios?

I guess for specific indicators, like discomfort, for example, it might be enough. The exact same goes for multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s and even breast cancer … I have at least six various examples that I currently proved that it’s not the THC/CBD ratios, or it’s not enough.

So after ruling out simply CBD and THC, I asked him, what does he believe is making the distinction?

I am 100%sure it’s not the THC and CBD since I currently eliminated them … however I’m still not actually sure about the rest. I’m believing that the flavonoids may be playing a huge function there … Just a few cannabinoids or households of cannabinoids, however mainly probably flavonoids and terpenoids – provide me a few more months and after that I’ll inform you.