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"Neither smoked marijuana nor THC are viable approaches in the treatment of glaucoma." American Medical Association, Report of the Council on Scientific Affairs, 10-1-97, Conclusions Aside from the Conclusions section, this report addresses the use of marijuana and dronabinol in the treatment of glaucoma on pages 12, 13 and 17. (Report of the Council on Scientific Affairs) "The dose of marijuana necessary to produce a clinically relevant effect in the short term appears to produce an unacceptable level of undesirable side effects such as euphoria, systemic hypotension, and/or dry eye and conjunctival hyperemia in the majority of glaucoma patients in whom the drug has been carefully studied."National Institutes of Health Report, page 12 A two-day scientific meeting "Workshop on the Medical Utility of Marijuana" was held on February 19-20, 1997 to "review the scientific data concerning the potential therapeutic uses for marijuana and the need for and feasibility of additional research." The report from this workshop addresses glaucoma on pages: 22 and 23. (National Institutes of Health Report) "Presently,
there is no scientifically verifiable evidence that marijuana or its derivatives are safe
and effective in the treatment of glaucoma. The availability of a wide variety of
alternative treatments that do not have marijuana's psychoactive and other specific side
effects argues against the use of marijuana for treating glaucoma. Marijuana offers no
advantage over currently available glaucoma drugs and indeed may be less effective than
these agents."
The National Eye Institute, Fact Sheet on the Therapeutic Use of Marijuana for Glaucoma
"...it’s well known that smoking marijuana can reduce pressure within the eye, a hallmark of the disease. But the drug may also reduce the blood supply to the optic nerve - the last thing a glaucoma sufferer needs - and it doesn’t seem to prevent blindness. Even if marijuana could save eyes, smoking it enough would take extraordinary effort. ‘In order to substantially reduce eye pressure,’ says Dr. Harry Quigley of John Hopkins University’s Wilmer Eye Institute, ‘you’d have to be stoned all the time.’" (Can Marijuana be Medicine?, Newsweek, February 3, 1997) "Glaucoma? It borders on malpractice to give marijuana for glaucoma. While it can reduce intraocular pressure (with huge doses of pot), it also can constrict blood supply to the optic nerve, exacerbating vision problems. There are far safer and better drugs." (Pot as Medicine, Washington Post, February 7, 1997) "Researchers seem to have lost interest in one once-promising use of marijuana - to treat glaucoma. They discovered early on that marijuana reduced the intraocular pressure resulting from this potentially blinding disease. However, the treatment never caught on with more than a handful of patients; to keep pressure down, marijuana must be taken every two to four hours, and patients didn’t like being high continuously. Also, many new drugs work well, with minimal side effects." (Marijuana as medicine - How strong is the science?, Consumer Reports, May, 1997) "Researchers do not know if marijuana would be additive to the new, very potent types of eyedrops now available to treat glaucoma, including alpha-2 agonists, dorzolamide and latanoprost (a prostaglandin that increases uveoscleral outflow and, like THC, causes conjunctival hyperemia). If marijuana were not to be additive to one of these agents, marijuana would be obsolete, since these agents have no systemic side effects (other than slightly dry mouth in some patients with apraclonidine and bromonidine), and they have a duration of action of 12 to 24 hours." Executive Summary, National Institute of Health Report, page 23) "When researchers tried dissolving THC in eye drops, they succeeded only in irritating people’s eyes but other compounds proved more useful. As a result, glaucoma patients can now choose from a number of potent topical treatments. The latest, a once-a-day eye drop called Xalatan, is virtually free of major side effects." (Can Marijuana be Medicine?, Newsweek, February 3, 1997) "Scientists have yet to figure out how marijuana lowers pressure in the eye, says Kaufman (Paul Kaufman, University of Wisconsin Medical School). This makes some scientists uneasy about its widespread use as a treatment for glaucoma." (Marijuana on Trial, Science News, March 22, 1997) |
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