It is the most common form of dementia,accounting for over 60% of cases and affecting over 33 million people worldwide.
Unfortunately the current approved AD treatments only provide limited therapeutic benefits.
-In an animal study a male mice at the age of 2.5 months were treated for 8 months with either 20 mg/kg CBD or vehicle pellets using a daily voluntary oral administration protocol. This assessed the long-term effect of CBD prior to “AD onset.”
The Results:
-The studies demonstrate the ability of CBD to reduce reactive gliosis and the neuroinflammatory response as well as to promote neurogenesis.
-Importantly, CBD also reverses and prevents the development of cognitive deficits in AD, prevent hippocampal and cortical neurodegeneration, have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties and regulate microglial cell migration.
-Interestingly, combination therapies of CBD and THC, the main active ingredient of cannabis sativa, show that CBD can antagonize the psychoactive effects associated with THC and possibly mediate greater therapeutic benefits than either phytocannabinoid alone.
"These properties suggest that CBD is perfectly placed to treat a number of pathologies typically found in AD."
Conclusion:
AD is a debilitating neurodegenerative disease that is becoming increasingly common in today's society. Unfortunately, there is still no effective treatment that stops or reverses the disease progression.
Unfortunately the current approved AD treatments only provide limited therapeutic benefits.
There are four approved drugs available, but unfortunately, all of them have been associated with adverse effects. Acetylcholinesterase inhibitors may cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and weight loss, while memantine is known to cause hallucinations, dizziness and fatigue.Furthermore, none of these treatments prevent or reverse the progression of the disease but rather they treat the disease symptoms with limited efficacy
Cannabidiol (CBD) is a non-psychoactive phytocannabinoid that has demonstrated neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. It is investigated as a potential multifunctional treatment option for AD.
Here, we summarize the current status quo of effects of CBD in established pharmacological and transgenic animal models for AD.The phytocannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD) is a prime candidate for this new treatment strategy.
The in vivo therapeutic potential of CBD in AD has not been widely documented, however, there are a number of studies that have reported the effect of CBD in pharmacological models of AD. These studies have described anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective effects of CBD.
Studies about CBD/THC & Alzheimer
-In an animal study a male mice at the age of 2.5 months were treated for 8 months with either 20 mg/kg CBD or vehicle pellets using a daily voluntary oral administration protocol. This assessed the long-term effect of CBD prior to “AD onset.”
Long-term CBD treatment was able to prevent the development of social recognition memory deficits without affecting anxiety domains in AD transgenic mice. These beneficial effects were not associated with a reduction in Aβ load or oxidative damage.
However, the study did report a complex interaction between CBD treatment, AD genotype and cholesterol and phytosterol levels, suggesting they may be involved in the mechanisms behind the beneficial effects of CBD. There was also a subtle impact of CBD on inflammatory markers of the brain
-Recent research has indicated that a combination of CBD and THC can avoid the detrimental effects caused by THC, and actually provide greater therapeutic benefits than either phytocannabinoid alone.
Importantly, there is controversy about what the ratios of CBD:THC should be used in order to antagonize detrimental THC effects. It has been reported that a >10-fold higher dose of CBD was necessary to prevent the unwanted side effects of THC.
Other research suggests that CBD may even modestly potentiate THC's psychoactive effects.
-A study conducted by Casarejos et al. (2013) investigated the effects of Sativex in a mouse model of tauopathy. This mouse model was foremost a model of frontotemporal dementia, parkinsonism and lower motor neuron disease.
The study found that Sativex decreased gliosis, increased the ratio of reduced/oxidized glutathione and reduced the levels of iNOS, thereby showing neuroprotective and anti-oxidant properties. Importantly, Sativex reduced Aβ and tau deposition in the hippocampus and cerebral cortex as well as increasing autophagy.
-Another study conducted by Aso et al. (2015) compared the effect of CBD, THC and a CBD-THC combination in mouse model, in the early symptomatic phase (~6 months).
This study found that all treatments improved memory deficits in the two-object recognition task but only the CBD-THC combination prevented the learning deficit seen in the active avoidance task.
Finally, reduced astrogliosis, microgliosis and inflammatory related molecules were more pronounced after treatment with the CBD-THC combination than either phytocannabinoid individually.
This suggests that when CBD and THC are combined there may be either a summative effect or an interaction effect between the compounds, which potentiates their therapeutic-like effects
The Results:
-The studies demonstrate the ability of CBD to reduce reactive gliosis and the neuroinflammatory response as well as to promote neurogenesis.
-Importantly, CBD also reverses and prevents the development of cognitive deficits in AD, prevent hippocampal and cortical neurodegeneration, have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties and regulate microglial cell migration.
-Interestingly, combination therapies of CBD and THC, the main active ingredient of cannabis sativa, show that CBD can antagonize the psychoactive effects associated with THC and possibly mediate greater therapeutic benefits than either phytocannabinoid alone.
"These properties suggest that CBD is perfectly placed to treat a number of pathologies typically found in AD."
Conclusion:
AD is a debilitating neurodegenerative disease that is becoming increasingly common in today's society. Unfortunately, there is still no effective treatment that stops or reverses the disease progression.
The studies reviewed in this mini review provide “proof of principle” for the therapeutic benefits of CBD and possibly CBD-THC combinations pose for AD therapy.However, further dose-dependent investigations into transgenic mouse models of AD are necessary to understand the full potential and the long-term effects of CBD.
The studies discussed here provide promising preliminary data and the translation of this preclinical work into the clinical setting could be realized relatively quickly: CBD is readily available, appears to only have limited side effects and is safe for human use.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
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