October 25, 2024

The longitudinal study led by Michelle R. Lent, PhD, a professor of Professional and Applied Psychology at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, found clinically meaningful improvements in health-related quality of life (HRQoL) for Pennsylvania Medical Marijuana patients.

The study looked at 400 cannabis naïve patients over the first three months of medical cannabis use and utilized the Short Form-36 scale and paired samples t-tests to measure HRQoL over time and found a “20% improvement in reported pain levels, a 20% increase in social functioning, and a 15% improvement in emotional well-being. The largest gains in physical functioning and pain levels occurred in younger participants compared to older respondents.”

An interesting aspect of this study was how the authors defined if a patient was “cannabis naïve.” While the published study does not outline this, Dr. Lent confirmed via email that the patients were naïve to a medical cannabis market and the study did not exclude patients with prior use of illicit or legal recreational cannabis. This could be seen as a potential limitation as the patient population includes patients with prior illicit- or recreational-use. However, the clinically meaningful improvements in HRQoL may speak to the quality of products and the guidance and expertise of the Pennsylvania Medical Marijuana Program over illicit or recreational sources as Pennsylvania is one of the few states that require state-licensed and certified cannabis pharmacists to be on-site at dispensaries. Further research is needed to elucidate these possibilities.