Marijuana use and schizophrenia

[yananshs]

Below is a transcript of a WPIX-Channel 11 story that aired Wednesday evening about the new Zucker Hillside Hospital story, suggesting that heavy marijuana use may put adolescents who are genetically predisposed to schizophrenia at greater risk of developing the disorder. The interview with Dr. Sanjiv Kumra, arranged by Michelle Pinto in my office, is airing on TV stations across the country. Also below is a UPI story that ran Thursday in The Washington Times on the same issue. Dr. Kumra collaborated on this study with Dr. Manzar Ashtari and their colleagues at Zucker Hillside.

BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT

PROGRAM: WB11 YOUR HEALTH
STATION: WPIX-TV
DATE/TIME: 11/30/05 10:00 PM
SUBJECT: EFFECTS OF MARIJUANA ON THE BRAIN
LENGTH: 3:07

KAITY TONG, ANCHOR: Many people don't consider marijuana a
dangerous drug, but a new study suggests otherwise. Researchers
have found it can have a profound negative impact on the
development of an adolescent's brain, and maybe even predispose
young new users to a serious mental illness. Dr. Mike is here now
with more on this. Very disturbing.

DR. MIKE ROSEN, MEDICAL REPORTER: Yeah, this is something else.
It appears that the threat is actually real. With the legal
drinking age at twenty-one, many teenagers have an easier time
getting hold of marijuana. But it may not be any safer. New
research shows that there are changes on brain scans of adolescents
who are heavy pot smokers. The scans show diminished development
in key areas, areas that are important for higher level thinking.

DR. SANJIV KUMRA, NORTH SHORE/LIJ HEALTH SYSTEM: This is a
(unclear) that's involved in language development. They are
becoming stronger as people get older.

DR. ROSEN: Actually, those areas are supposed to be getting
stronger.

DR. KUMRA: We know that the type of essay that you can write in
grade nine is very different from the type of essay that you write
at the end of college.

DR. ROSEN: But with heavy pot smoking, there's now visual evidence
this and other key areas of the brain may very well be damaged,
perhaps permanently. The researchers compared the brains of non-
pot smoking kids to heavy smokers, actually creating an average
brain of each group using a technique called Diffusion Tensor
Imaging.

DR. KUMRA: And then we subtract those two images to see where the
brains are different. And that's where we end up with these
different, sort of orange blobs that sort of tell us that these
fore-brain regions that we've identified are different in the
healthy adolescents who smoke cannabis as compared to the healthy
adolescents who don't smoke cannabis.

DR. ROSEN: The researchers found the abnormalities were the same
as those found in schizophrenics, and when they looked at
schizophrenics who smoked pot, the abnormalities were even more
pronounced. So, in addition to interfering with normal brain
development, heavy marijuana use in adolescence may also lead to an
earlier onset of schizophrenia in those predisposed to the
disorder.

DR. KUMRA: For people who think that marijuana is a safe drug or
that it's a benign drug, we have evidence that that may not be
true. And we think even more so I think that the adolescents who
are at risk for developing schizophrenia, this may be a very
dangerous drug for them to be using.

DR. ROSEN: Marijuana is the most widely used illegal drug. Over
twenty-five million individuals used it in 2003. Around one out of
three of these meet criteria established by the American
Psychiatric Association for either dependence or frank abuse of
marijuana. And, get this, approximately one in five high school
students smoke pot at least once a month. So, it's widespread.
For more on this story, go to our website at wb11.com/drmike.

TONG: Let me ask you this: just how common is schizophrenia, and
how much of a factor is smoking marijuana causing it?

DR. ROSEN: This is amazing. I was a psych major. One percent of
the population has schizophrenia, and it's believed that many more
people are predisposed to it. So this is a disorder where you have
genetics, and you have environmental factors, and they think that
marijuana may be one of those environmental factors that can tip
these people predisposed to schizophrenia to get it. And that's
why this is such an important issue.

[yananshs]

Brain scans link pot, schizophrenia
Dec. 1, 2005 at 12:00PM
Brain scans show adolescents using marijuana have brain construction deficits similar to schizophrenia.
In fact, researchers using a technique called diffusion tensor imaging report that adolescents who are genetically at risk for schizophrenia may increase that risk by heavy use of marijuana.
Manzar Ashtari, a scientist at Zucker Hillside Hospital, Glen Oaks, N.Y., showed in four small studies "that marijuana affects areas of the brain that are still developing during adolescence and these are the same areas that are affected by schizophrenia."
Non-drug-using, healthy adolescents have significant developmental activity in the arcuate fasciculus -- an area of the brain still developing during late childhood.
Damage in this area of the brain was evident in scans from 15 otherwise healthy marijuana smokers and 15 schizophrenics who smoked marijuana. This brain region controls speech development, language interpretation and higher-order functions.
The studies show heavy marijuana use could trigger schizophrenia in adolescents genetically at risk for the mental disorder, but Ashtari cautioned that the studies are limited by their small size.

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