With a huge surge in CBD popularity we are also seeing a rise in potential benefits from CBD. One of the more interesting ones being the psychoactive effects of THC are subverted, and the focus is primarily on the healing properties. According to a study on the Therapeutic benefits of CBD, CBD has been shown to have beneficial properties towards anxiolytic (used to reduce anxiety) and neuro protective properties (preservation of neuron structures and functions).
Shown in the article, researchers set out to highlight advancements in clinical uses of CBD in these areas to show the therapeutic benefits of CBD.
How CBD Can Reduce Anxiolytic Properties
Cannabis has shown to have a rather large number of chemical compounds, over 100 that are more closely related to CBD. Another interesting bonus found about CBD is that “CBD both blocked and potentiated the effects of Δ9-THC” experiments shed light on how when given a control group large doses THC, anxiety and psychotic symptoms were triggered and got steadily worse then were “attenuated when CBD was administered”. CBD not only negated the effect of the psychoactive THC properties but it continued to help get anxiety under control.
This not only showed us that CBD can reduce the effects of THC but it has opened the door to understanding how CBD could have therapeutic benefits towards anxiolytic properties. Keep one’s anxiety under control.
To pinpoint the potential anxiolytic effects of CBD researchers did a controlled study where they had volunteers use the Simulated Public Speaking Test (SPST). Volunteers talk in front of a camera where they record their levels of anxiety and its physiological concomitants (what naturally accompanies something). Once they had marked their “base line” they administered THC to spike their levels to see if CDB, when added would help bring them down to their base or better.
“Through this test, the effects of CBD (300 mg) were compared with those produced by two anxiolytic compounds, ipsapirone (5 mg) and diazepam (10 mg), in a double-blind, placebo-controlled procedure. The findings demonstrated that CBD and the two other anxiolytic compounds all attenuated anxiety induced by the SPST.”
There was a noticeable reduction in heart rate and blood pressure after administering CBD during this test further showed that CBD has these anxiolytic properties. THC psychoactive effects were brought down as well as their anxiolytic levels.
How The Brain Reacts To CBD
When taking images of the brain after being administered CBD, researches results found that “an increase in the left parahippocampal gyrus activity and a decrease in left amigdala-hippocampus complex, extending to the left posterior cingulate cortex and the hypothalamus 4 This brain activity pattern associated with the use of CBD was regarded as compatible with a central anxiolytic effect in these areas.” After reviewing the images they concluded that the areas of our brain that deal with anxiety were showing significantly lower levels of anxiety than before,
What really stuck out as the most impressive find in this whole case study was that CBD was shown to lower measures of anxiety without the sedation of the subject. Slowing down activity in the hippocampus, parahippocampal and left temporal gyrus were all a factor in reducing anxiety in subjects.
In Conclusion
The therapeutic benefits of CBD when delivered to humans doesn’t produce the psychoactive effects commonly associated with THC. THC itself has been shown to increase anxiolytic, antiepileptic, and antipsychotic properties but when CBD isolated from cannabis shows that it can in fact reduce anxiolytic, antiepileptic, and antipsychotic properties. Administering CDB can help reduce these anxiolytic effects.
Case Study Article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6161644/
