Inflammation
Inflammation is the body’s attempt to protect itself from harmful stimuli, including damaged cells, irritants, or pathogens. When something harmful or irritating affects a part of our body, there is a biological response to try to remove it. The signs and symptoms of inflammation include redness, swelling, fever or pain. This beneficial process is referred to as acute inflammation. As the body heals itself, the signs of inflammation slowly fade in a matter of days, sometimes weeks. However a much more insidious type of inflammation, termed chronic inflammation, may be wrecking havoc in the body.
Chronic inflammation is not part of the body’s natural healing process. It occurs when the body’s inflammatory response doesn’t shut off. A hyped up immune system begins damaging healthy tissue in your body. Conditions including asthma, allergies, arthritis, and autoimmune disorders have a clear inflammatory component, but studies indicate that chronic inflammation may also be at the root of several other diseases. Chronic inflammation is thought to play a role in cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, depression, Alzheimer’s disease, and the visible signs of ageing.
Reducing Inflammation
The best way to prevent or heal chronic inflammation to is adopt dietary and lifestyle changes that promote the body’s natural healing process. It has been shown that certain foods, chemicals, stress and even thoughts have a huge ability to influence our health. Each day we make dozens of choices to either heal or harm our bodies. The first step is to remove triggers by reducing your intake of inflammatory foods and participating in lifestyle habits that are causing the inflammation. Second, heal existing inflammation with anti-inflammatory foods and supplements. And finally, give your body time to heal. Damage to the body that has occurred over decades will not heal overnight.
CBD Hemp Oil and Inflammation
If the body is in a state of chronic disease or emotional stress, the immune system can fall behind and spin out of control leading to disease. It is here that phytocannabinoids such as CBD can pitch in to support the stressed immune system and help return the body to health. CBD has many therapeutic benefits such as
having anti-seizure properties, being used as an anticancer agent or reducing anxiety. One of the most important health benefits of cannabinoids is their anti-inflammatory property. They act as modulators of the inflammatory cytokine cascade responsible for development of chronic disease. CBD and other cannabinoids help maintain homeostasis throughout the body and allow us keep a sense of well-being.
Healing Opportunities of CBD Hemp Oil
Although there is limited clinical research regarding the health benefits of CBD hemp oil, there is enough to demonstrate that healing opportunities that CBD oil presents. Pre-clinical research has shown CBD to have a range of effects that may be therapeutically useful, including anti-seizure, antioxidant, neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, anti-tumor, anti-psychotic, and anti-anxiety properties. [1]
There are also numerous anecdotal reports from large numbers of people worldwide show that there are many therapeutic and health benefits of CBD hemp oil. Health-seekers worldwide are consuming CBD hemp oil in hopes that they might benefit from its supposed effects—and many are reporting positive experiences in line with what the researchers are finding. [2]
CBD is unique in that it has a wide range of effects on many of the body’s most important systems that are responsible for regulating our health. CBD has an affinity for activating serotonin receptors (specifically 5-HT1A), which control anxiety, calmness and mood; vanilloid receptors, which control and modulate how we experience pain; adenosine receptors, which control the quality and depth of our sleep; and indirectly influences endocannabinoid receptors, which control memory, energy levels, stress levels, pain tolerance, body temperature and appetite, among many others things. [3] CBD is being hailed in many scientific circles as one of the most remarkable new medicines discovered in decades. The following are just a few of the conditions that CBD may be used to provide healing opportunities.
Neuroprotection
Neuroprotection refers to the therapies and strategies used to defend the central nervous system (CNS) against neuronal injury due to both acute (e.g. stroke or trauma) and chronic neurodegenerative disorders (e.g. Alzheimer’s disease, and Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis). CBD has been shown to have neuroprotective properties in cell cultures as well as in animal models of several neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s, stroke, glutamate toxicity, multiple sclerosis (MS) and Parkinson’s disease. [4]
Migraine, Fibromyalgia and Irritable bowel syndrome
IBS patients are more likely to have other disorders, including migraines, fibromyalgia, and even depression. Studies show that that these disorders may actually be manifestations of the same underlying biologic mechanism. [5]
Migraine, fibromyalgia, IBS and related conditions display common clinical, biochemical and pathophysiological patterns that suggest an underlying clinical endocannabinoid deficiency that may be suitably treated with cannabinoid medicines. [6] Dr. Ethan Russo believes that supplementing an impaired ECS with plant cannabinoids will bring it back to optimum function, thus provoking an improvement in any associated conditions.
Antitumoral
There are studies indicating how both phytocannabinoids and endocannabinoids can directly kill or inhibit most major forms of tumoral formation. [7] They restore the ability of damaged cells to undergo programmed cell death, slow tumoral cell reproduction, prevent tumors from forming their own blood vessels, and inhibit the spread of damaged cells within local tissue and to other tissues. [8]
Antiemetic
One of the therapeutic effects of CBD is its antiemetic, or anti-nausea/vomiting, ability. Researchers have found this complex network of cannabinoid receptor sites plays a direct role in regulating both nausea and vomiting. [9] Because of such activity, researchers have found cannabis significantly reduces nausea and vomiting due to chemotherapy and other pharmacological treatments. Studies have found that one of the major cannabinoids found in cannabis, cannabidiol (CBD), is effective at treating the more difficult to control symptoms of nausea, as well as preventing anticipatory nausea in chemotherapy patients. [10,11]
Pain Relief
Chronic pain is a complex condition that may be related to an old injury or underlying condition such as arthritis, nerve damage or multiple sclerosis. Both the immune and the nerve systems are engaged and they stimulate each other to create, sometimes, a vicious cycle of pain and inflammation. CBD works in both systems, the immune and the neuro-cognitive to reduce pain, inflammation, and overall discomfort related to a variety of health conditions. [12] Cannabinoids may represent a novel class of therapeutic agents for the treatment of chronic pain and other disease. [13]
Inflammation and Autoimmune Conditions
Autoimmune disease occurs when your immune system mistakes your body’s own healthy cells as invaders and then repeatedly attacks them. It is believed that all autoimmune conditions have three factors in common: a genetic susceptibility, environmental exposure to a trigger and increased intestinal permeability, referred to the autoimmune triad. [14]
The key to treating autoimmunity is to support and strengthen the immune system by getting to the root of why the immune system went rogue in the first place.
CBD can benefit those suffering from a wide range of autoimmune disorders because, the compound activates a system of receptors inherently present in the human body that regulate inflammation and immune cell activity. [15] By reduced intestinal permeability and inflammation, CBD has the ability to address one of the modifiable factors involved in the autoimmune triad. [16]
References
[1-4] Volkow, Nora D. “Cannabidiol: Barriers to Research and Potential Medical Benefits.” Drug Caucus Hearing on Barriers to Cannabidiol Research, United States Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control. June 24, 2015 Retrieved from https://www.drugabuse.gov/about-nida/legislative-activities/testimony-to-congress/2016/biology-potential-therapeutic-effects-cannabidiol [5] Cole, Alexander J. “Migraine, fibromyalgia, and depression among people with IBS: a prevalence study.” BMC Gastroenterology 20066:26 September 28, 2006 Retrieved from https://bmcgastroenterol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-230X-6-26 [6] Russo EB. “Clinical endocannabinoid deficiency (CECD): can this concept explain therapeutic benefits of cannabis in migraine, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome and other treatment-resistant conditions?” Neuro Endocrinol Lett. 2008 Apr;29(2):192-200. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18404144 [7-8] Kander, Justin. “Cannabis for the Treatment of Cancer: The Anticancer Activity of Phytocannabinoids and Endocannabinoids.” Amazon Digital Services. July 27, 2015. [9] Sharket, Keith A. et. al. “Regulation of nausea and vomiting by cannabinoids and the endocannabinoid system.” Eur J Pharmacol. Pg. 722 January 5, 2014 Retrieved at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3883513/ [10] Machado Rocha, F.C., Stefano, S.C., De Cassia Haiek, R., Rosa Oliveira, L.M., and Da Silveira, D.X. (2008, September). Therapeutic use of Cannabis sativa on chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting among cancer patients: systematic review and meta-analysis. European Journal of Cancer Care, 17(5), 431-43. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2354.2008.00917.x/full. [11] Parker, L.A., Rock, E.M., and Limbeer, C.L. (2011, August). Regulation of nausea and vomiting by cannabinoids. British Journal of Pharmacology, 163(7), 1411-22. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3883513/. [12] Russo, E. B. (2008, February). Cannabinoids in the management of difficult to treat pain. Therapeutics and Clinical Risk Management, 4(1), 245-259. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2503660/ [13] Volkow, N. D. (2015, June 24). The biology and potential therapeutic effects of cannabidiol. [14] Fasano A. Leaky gut and autoimmune diseases. Clinic Rev Allerg Immunol. 2012;42(1):71-78. [15] Witkamp, R. “The endocannabinoid system: an emerging key player in inflammation. Curr Opin Clin Nutr Metab Care. March 17, 2014Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=The+endocannabinoid+system%3A+an+emerging+key+player+in+inflammation [16] Alharmoruni, A. Cannabinoids mediate opposing effects on inflammation-induced intestinal permeability.” British Journal of Pharmacology 165:8 March 23, 2012 Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1476-5381.2011.01589.x/full