Researching an illicit, schedule I
drug is difficult for a multitude of reasons. The first issue lies in obtaining
the approval in order to procure enough of the substance legally in order to
conduct studies. Secondly, the legal confidentiality and protection of the
study participants is of great importance, and also takes many resources in
order to ensure non-disclosure.
Another inherent problem of
researching a natural substance is the variability in the strength and
composition of each individual plant. Although there are standard amounts of
delta 9 THC per dose set, the amount administered in each sitting is also
variable depending on the route of intake. Once administered, the
pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics are also difficult to study in marijuana.
It has a long half life, because it accumulates in body fat, and recirculates
throughout the liver. Also, it exhibits
user-dependent bioavailability, and tolerance develops pharmacological effects
such as cardiovascular effects. Furthermore, understanding the duration of
acute or chronic withdrawal effects requires technology beyond that of a simple
urine test.
The study of a drug of abuse also
poses ethical dilemmas, because an ideal control group is made up of
participants who have never been introduced to the drug. However, introducing
such a drug is very unethical, so the control participants usually end up being
occasional users. In turn, the user group is dependent on the definition of the
control groups and vice-versa.
Finally, when introducing a
substance and studying its internal effects, a “chicken or the egg” type of
situation is always possible. An example the authors in the article
ask, “did the altered functioning
create the need for enhanced cannabinoid stimulation or did the enhanced
cannabinoid stimulation create the altered functioning?” This is mostly due to the fact that baseline data
of brain function and structure does not exist and is very difficult to obtain.
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