Can Cannabis Help Reduce Fatigue? – Cannabis News, Lifestyle

Can Cannabis Help Reduce Fatigue? Normally one would think that cannabis causes fatigue. An indica brand will glue you to the couch. A sativa strain might make you alert and active, but after the high wears off you’re tired or “burned out” right? According to a new US study, it depends on the individual.

“[T]The magnitude of the effect and the magnitude of the side effects experienced are likely to differ,” the authors write in the article published in a scientific journal. “[H]Healthcare providers and consumers still have little formal guidance from the scientific and medical community on how the cannabis-based products they choose may affect feelings of fatigue and energy levels.”

The researchers looked at 1,224 people who used the Releaf app from June 6, 2016 to August 7, 2019. They tracked 3,922 cannabis sessions. With this app, they were able to track users in real time and record their experiences. Users self-reported why they bought a particular strain, how much they consumed, and the relief, feelings, and side effects they experienced.

Cannabis helped reduce fatigue

So does cannabis help reduce fatigue? Certainly seems so. The results were impressive. “On average, 91.94 percent of people felt reduced fatigue after consumption,” the study says. When users were asked to rate the reduction in fatigue on a scale of zero to 10, most study participants gave it a 3.5.

More importantly, there was no real difference between indica and sativa strains. Cannabis helped reduce fatigue regardless of what type of cannabis they were consuming. Individuals reported that smoking joints provided better relief than smoking from a pipe or using a vaporizer (vaping ranked lowest).

THC and CBD levels “were generally not associated with changes in symptom intensity.”

Cannabis doesn’t always help

While 37 percent of study participants found cannabis helped reduce fatigue, about a quarter disagreed. Instead, they had the stereotypical effect of feeling unmotivated or couch-locked. However, these people were in the minority, and it looks like other studies could confirm this.

Another US study, published in 2021, examined the relationship between cannabis and exercise in young and middle-aged adults. “Marijuana use is not significantly associated with exercise, contrary to popular belief that marijuana users are less active,” the researchers wrote. But the study found a positive association between the two.

The first study concludes that further research would provide more insight into cannabis’ role in reducing fatigue. It proposes to study the real-time effects of cannabis on fatigue by conducting clinical trials.