How frequently does cannabis trigger psychotic symptoms?

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2024-06-03 19:00

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About one in 200 cannabis users may experience a full psychotic episode related to using the drug, according to international researchers. The team collated different types of studies on cannabis-associated psychotic symptoms to estimate how frequently they occur and what factors may increase the risk. The team looked at 162 studies including observational studies, experimental studies on THC (the main psychoactive substance in cannabis) and medicinal cannabis research. The team say cannabis-related psychotic symptoms were more common in the observational and experimental studies, and some people appeared to be more at risk than others, such as younger people, people with pre-existing mental health problems and people exposed to high levels of THC.

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Journal/
conference: Nature Mental Health

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: University of Lausanne, Switzerland

Funder: This research was funded in whole, or in part, by the Wellcome Trust (grant nos. 218641/Z/19/Z (to T.S.) and 215917/Z/19/Z (to J.R.B.)). For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a CC BY public copyright license to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising from this submission. J.-B.P. is funded by the Medical Research Foundation 2018 Emerging Leaders First Prize in Adolescent Mental Health (MRF-160-0002-ELP-PINGA (to J.-B.P.)). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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