July 5, 2023 – Smoking an excessive amount of marijuana significantly increases health risks related to elective surgery, a brand new study reports.
Complications include blood clots, stroke, kidney problems and even death, in accordance with the JAMA Surgery.
“Our findings complement previous studies that have found significant associations between cannabis use disorders and perioperative complications,” wrote the authors from the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. The perioperative period refers back to the time from hospital admission through surgery to discharge and recovery.
The researchers examined data from the National Inpatient Sample database from 2016 to 2019 on greater than 12,000 hospitalizations for 11 elective, noncardiac procedures, starting from hernia repair to colon surgery, from knee alternative to spinal fusion.
About half of the themes suffered from cannabis use disorder, i.e. dependence on weed, which occurs in 30% of stoners. The other half of the themes didn’t suffer from cannabis use disorder.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse defines dependence because the occurrence of cravings or lack of appetite, irritability, restlessness, and mood and sleep disturbances after quitting. It becomes an addiction when the person cannot stop using marijuana since it interferes with elements of every day life.
Patients with cannabis use disorder were “carefully compared with patients without cannabis use disorder”, CNN reported. “Compared to people who were not overly dependent or addicted to marijuana, people with cannabis use disorder were more likely to experience complications from these surgeries.”
The difference was a 7.73% higher risk of perioperative morbidity and mortality in individuals with the disorder, in comparison with 6.57% in people without the disorder. This is a major difference, the study authors wrote. People with the disorder also had longer hospital stays and better bills.
“Against the backdrop of increasing rates of cannabis use, our findings support preoperative screening for cannabis use disorders,” the authors write.