Oral Cannabis Is an Ineffective Analgesic

Cannabinoids are helpful in alleviating chronic pain. In studies of acute pain, however, results have been conflicting but suggest that cannabinoids have greater efficacy in women than in men. In a randomized, double-blind, controlled study, researchers in Austria used two established acute pain models to evaluate the analgesic effects of oral cannabis extract in 18 healthy female volunteers.

In the first pain model, after a 5-cm sunburn spot was induced through irradiation on one upper leg of each woman, each volunteer received either standardized cannabis extract or diazepam placebo. Tolerance of electrical pain and heat stimuli at the sunburn site was measured before and at 2, 4, and 8 hours after administration of the study medications. …