The researchers looked at brain scans from about 850 substance-using adults ages 18 to 55 and about substance-using 440 teens ages 14 to 19, all of whom reported varying levels of alcohol and cannabis use. For the study, which was published in January, researchers used fMRI scans to see how two alcoholic drinks impacts brain function in 50 healthy adult males. Compared with sober participants, the intoxicated volunteers were found to have reduced functioning in the prefrontal cortex, an area of the brain linked with moderating social behavior.
- Our clinicians have all been hand-selected and personally trained by Dr. Amen, whose mission is to end mental illness by creating a revolution in brain health.
- As of March 2024, 17 states have legalized marijuana for medicinal purposes.
- Cannabis also has health and medical benefits which include reducing pain, improving sexual libido, treating inflammation, and acting as neuroprotectants.
Cannabis 101
“It’s important to make your doctor aware of any substance you’re taking, whether its an over the counter medication or herbal medicine,” Colvin said. “It can increase or decrease effectiveness or levels of medicine that you’re taking. Some compounds that are found in marijuana are using the same pathways to be metabolized as other common heart medications.” This includes blood thinners, anti-cholesterol medications and some blood pressure medicines. Chronic or excessive alcohol consumption is known to affect balance and disrupts normal walking patterns.
On the other side of the coin, researchers have found that cannabinoids — which are the active compounds in marijuana — could help to prevent migraine, and a more recent study linked marijuana use to an increased sex drive. After cannabis is ingested, an observable increase in regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) occurs in anterior brain regions — which are critical for semantic memory, according to a 2001 study in Neuropsychopharmacology. During the early stages of drinking, the brain releases more of the “feel good” chemical dopamine.
Marijuana isn’t perfectly safe
The question of whether alcohol or marijuana is worse for health is being debated once again, this time, sparked by comments that President Barack Obama made in a recent interview with The New Yorker magazine. There probably isn’t a perfect way to evaluate and present all drug harms. Researchers will always need to balance making information simple and accessible for policymakers and the public with the inherent complexity of drugs and their effects. This makes the task of building scientific drug policies very challenging. Jon Caulkins, a drug policy expert at Carnegie Mellon University, gave the example of an alien race visiting Earth and asking which land animal is the biggest. If the question is about weight, the African elephant is the biggest land animal.
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Cannabis is not an FDA-approved substance and is still illegal under federal law. The information provided on this website is intended for educational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. It is not intended as medical advice and should not be considered as a substitute for advice from a healthcare professional. We strongly recommend that you consult with a physician or other qualified healthcare provider before using any cannabis products. The use of any information provided on this website is solely at your own risk. A 2017 review of existing studies notes that people who use alcohol and weed together tend to consume more of both.
A panel of University of Michigan Health, Michigan Medicine, experts discuss how the use of cannabis and alcohol can be linked to cardiovascular health. Euphoric effects generally kick in within the first 10 to 15 minutes and are correlated with transient changes in the brain’s electroencephalographic activity (EEG) activity. Essentially, as blood alcohol content (BAC) rises, marked changes can be seen in the electrical activity of the brain. After being absorbed through the lining of the stomach into the bloodstream, it spreads into tissues throughout the body and reaches the brain in about five minutes, according to Northwestern Medicine.
State laws vary on whether and where these drinks can be sold and on age restrictions. Varieties of cannabis that contain low levels of THC (less than 0.3%) are classified as hemp, while those with more than 0.3% THC are considered cannabis. However, the type and amount of cannabinoids that different cannabis-based products claim to contain vary widely — and the labels aren’t necessarily accurate, says Dr. Gruber.
Therefore, it’s important to understand how these interactions could impact your health before considering this combination. The research on other health effects of marijuana is inconclusive but should warrant some caution. One study linked the use of potent marijuana to psychotic disorders, but other studies suggest people with amp on drug screen psychotic disorders may be predisposed to pot use. Research on whether smoked marijuana causes lung disease or cancer has yielded conflicting results, with studies that control for tobacco smoking finding no significant effect from marijuana on lung cancer risk.
While, due to alcohol being legal for decades and drunk driving being illegal for a significant amount of time the law has preset blood alcohol levels to dictate how much alcohol is too much in your system while driving. Now while cannabis deaths caused by disease, illness or drug interactions there are some data points regarding accidents, specifically car accidents. Legalization has provided data points about the potential increase in accidents related to cannabis. As with the short-term effects of alcohol and weed, the long-term effects differ from person to person. Research has shown that patients who use medical marijuana experience less depression than patients who don’t use it, although scientists still don’t quite understand what makes cannabis effective at treating mood disorders. Daily marijuana use raises the risk of stroke by 42% and heart attack by 25%, even if there is no prior history of heart disease and the person has never smoked or vaped tobacco, according to a February 2024 study.
“Excess alcohol is going to lead to very severe consequences, and chronic excess alcohol is the most likely to lead to a lot of threatening issues,” Murray said. This means that for people taking drugs or medications while drinking, the alcohol can increase or decrease levels of the active drug in the body. The question policy experts typically ask isn’t which drug is more dangerous, but how marijuana and alcohol should be treated through policy as individual drugs with their own set of unique, complicated risks. That doesn’t mean just legalization or prohibition, but regulation, taxes, and education as well.
