Medical Cannabis and the Treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea: An American Academy of Sleep Medicine Position Statement

Obstructive sleep apnea is a sleep disorder causing episodic airway obstruction that results in the brief “apneic” (cessation of breathing) episodes for brief periods of time. A recent study investigating Dronabinol, a synthetic cannabis derivative, as a potential therapy for sleep apnea resulted in an improvement of 32% in the apnea-hypopnea index. However, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine does not endorse medical cannabis as a treatment for sleep apnea, due to what they point to as a lack of knowledge surrounding the long-term effects of its use. ” Based on these results, cannabis and its components should be further researched to determine its potential for sleep apnea treatment.

This paper is also stored here: http://bit.ly/2YZDTN3 inside the CED Foundation Archive