Does cannabis have a place in Autism treatment? Dr. Bonni Goldstein says “yes.” Hope Grows for Autism asked Dr. Goldstein to speak to this from her decade of experience treating thousands of patients as medical director of Canna-Center in California.
The drugs prescribed for ASD do not manage the core symptoms and basically sedate the person. Dr. Goldstein lays out a clear path of hope for families to use cannabis to manage ASD core symptoms for a better quality of life.
Dr. Goldstein explains how several compounds in cannabis, CBD and THC in particular, mirror certain chemical our bodies make, called anandamide and 2-AG. These chemicals help regulate our systems and bring them back to balance through the Endocannabinoid system.
Studies show children with Autism Spectrum Disorder need more of these chemicals than their bodies produce. At least four other studies in the past three years show two-thirds of the children experienced improvement using tinctures of CBD and THC to treat core symptoms like self-injury behavior, rage, sleep, and anxiety.
Fortunately, Dr. Goldstein recently updated her book Cannabis Revealed. Cannabis Is Medicine: How Medical Cannabis and CBD Are Healing Everything from Anxiety to Chronic Pain is now available for those who want to earn more about using cannabis to help manage autism.
