Its 2024 and youre just out here trying to give a damn.
Maybe youve even subbed outwinefor weed, especially sinceresearchshows that drinking alcohol can be really hard on your heart.
[Heavy sigh while exhaling a huge cloud of smoke.]
Svitlana/Adobe Stock/Craftery Co./Amanda K Bailey
Celebrities like John Mayer have reportedly made a permanent switch from alcohol to cannabis too.
Weed is appealing to many folks for more than just the high right now.
If youre one of them, were not here to take that away from you.
Lets light this conversation up.
Cannabis is associated with serious heart complicationsincluding heart attack and stroke.
Many assume that the drug is harmless, given the increasing legalization of marijuana in states across the country.
We should also remember that smoking cigarettes is legal, but we all know thats bad for us.
The cannabis flower is filled with between80 and 100 cannabinoidsthat affect your body in different ways.
These different compounds can have different effects on your system.
When it comes to your heart, the news is less rosyand thats because of THC.
Building on this research, a separatelarge-scale Stanford studytried to answer why.
Heres how this all stacks up to booze, heart-health-wise.
Its a bit of a game of apple (martinis) versus orange (kush) here.
Alcohol and weed work very differently in your body.
Correlations between increased amounts of either substance are associated with higher risks for your heart.
There is definitely a dose-dependent response, Dr. Chandy says.
In the past few years, leading health organizations have come out against any alcohol use.
At the end of the day (perhaps the kind where youreallyneed a drink?
), were talking about correlation, not causality.
What about if you only use weed occasionallythats probably better, right?
Yeah, it seems like it.
According to Dr. Chandy, [The harm] does seem to be correlated with the amount thats used.
In pens or other inhalable options, youll find just the percentage of THC that youll consume.
Again, for your heart, the lower the percentage of THC here, the better.
Heres the bottom line about what we know about cannabis and heart health so far.
Another smaller study seemed to indicate that medical cannabislowered systolic and diastolic blood pressurein older adults.
