Daily consumption cannabis may lead to psychosis

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The daily consumption of cannabis predisposes to the appearance of psychosis and schizophrenia, and those episodes of psychosis which are fruit of this substance present certain specific characteristics, both before their appearance and in the clinical presentation of the psychosis. This is one of the conclusions of the doctoral thesis "Neurodevelopment and environmental stress in initial psychosis: transversal analysis of the ESPIGAS study", carried out by researcher Miguel Ruiz Veguilla, of the Institute of Neurosciences of the University of Granada (Spain) and supervised by professors Manuel Gurpegui Fernndez de Legaria and Jorge Cervilla Ballesteros Ruiz Veguilla is also the person in charge fo the Unit of Development Neuropsychiatry of Jan (Spain).

This work has studied the risk factors linked to schizophrenia, identifying and characterizing in depth those psychosis linked to a continual consumption of cannabis. They carried out a study with 92 subjects, 50 of which had developed a psychosis without presenting signs of an "abnormal neurodevelopment", this is, they had been doing well academically, they had a group of friends (no social isolation) and they presented a good motor coordination. In addition, these subjects did not show a family history of episodes of psychosis in first or second degree.

Identifying a new type of psychosis
The research work carried out by Miguel Ruiz Veguilla has identified a correlation between cannabis consumption and psychosis in subjects with a good premorbid performance, and without signs of minor neurological alterations, which in his opinion might point out "a psychopathological way linked to psychosis in subjects with less predisposition".

Thus, 66% of the patients with psychosis who took part in the study and had a normal neurodevelopment admitted to have consumed cannabis daily or almost every day, whereas 43% of the participants with markers of an abnormal neurodevelopment (those already indicated: bad prior social and academic behaviour, a family history and a "clumsier" attitude when they carry out tasks of motor coordination and complex motor acts) were drug users too.

In the light of the results of his doctoral thesis, the researcher of the University of Granada says that, after having identified a type of psychosis where the environmental factor plays a more relevant role, we should now answer the question of which is the prognosis, in the long term, of those subjects with a good prior behaviour, whose psychosis is linked to a high consumption of cannabis.

The results of this research work have been reported in the journals Schizophrenia Research and European Psychiatry, two of the most renowned worldwide publications in this research field.


Posted by: JoAnn    Source