Cannabis Treatment Reduces Chronic Nerve Pain With ‘Minimal To No Side Effects,’ New Scientific Review Finds

A newly published review of research on marijuana and chronic nerve pain concludes that treatment with cannabinoids offers “significant relief from chronic pain” with “minimal to no side effects”—potentially providing patients a “life-changing alternative” to conventional pharmaceuticals.

“The positive effects of cannabinoids in pain management are clear and their merit in the treatment thereof is evident,” says the research, published last month in the journal Cureus. It adds that “the fact that cannabinoids are natural garners it support over traditional synthetic and semi-synthetic drugs.”

Authors considered thousands of research papers for the review, ultimately including in their analysis five placebo-controlled randomized control studies published between 2000 and 2024. They found that treatment with cannabinoids offered markedly more pain relief than did placebo.

“Compared to placebo, cannabinoids provided significant relief from chronic pain (33% vs 15%) as measured by the visual analog scale,” the paper says. “The transdermal application of CBD led to a more pronounced reduction in sharp pain, according to the neuropathic pain scale. Minimal to no side effects were recorded, further highlighting the potential benefits of cannabinoids.”

Authors, from Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam Medical College, in Mauritius, noted that while there’s still “insufficient evidence available on their long-term adverse effects and drug interactions, due to their ambiguous legal status and heightened social taboos globally,” the results indicate that cannabinoids nevertheless offer a paradigm-changing alternative to pharmaceuticals.

“The potential benefit of cannabinoids is that they are naturally derived drugs that have already been shown to have the potential to effectively decrease chronic pain with minimal side effects as compared to the standard drugs being used,” the review concludes. “The ability of cannabinoids to provide pain relief with minimal side effects and concurrently be a naturally derived product may potentially be a life-changing alternative that the pharmaceutical market is in dire need of.”

The research looked specifically at neuropathic pain, caused by damage to or dysfunction of the nervous system and often associated with conditions such as diabetes, HIV/AIDS, shingles, multiple sclerosis and even side-effects from certain pharmaceutical drugs or radiation therapy. Treatment of such pain “is a complex endeavor,” the paper notes, “which often requires specialist care and intensive drug therapy.”

“Cannabis-derived drugs in their most effective formulation and dosage can be a major breakthrough in the treatment of chronic pain,” authors continue. “It is thus obvious that a greater emphasis should be put on medical cannabis as a treatment option through larger scale clinical trials.”

As more states have legalized medical marijuana, pain has been a top qualifying condition in most jurisdictions. That’s backed up by reports from patients and health care providers indicating that cannabis is an effective tool for pain management.

A research letter published last month by the American Medical Association, for example, found that 71 percent of chronic pain patients and 59 percent of physicians are in favor of nationally legalizing medical cannabis. The study involved interviews with 1,661 chronic pain patients and 1,000 doctors. It was partly funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).

“Overall, people with chronic pain were more supportive of the policies that would expand access to medical cannabis, and providers were more supportive of the policies that would restrict access to medical cannabis,” said Elizabeth Stone, the lead author of the study at the Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research.

Meanwhile, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) also recently published a wide-ranging series of scientific reports on marijuana and cancer as part of an effort to better understand “core questions” around patients’ relationship with cannabis—including sourcing, cost, behavioral patterns, patient–provider communications and reasons for use.

One of the studies looked specifically at patients who use medical marijuana as an alternative to opioids to treat their cancer-related pain.

Another study published last month found that patients who used medical marijuana for three months improved on a variety of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) measures, including physical functioning, bodily pain, social functioning, fatigue and general health.

Patients who used a CBD vaginal suppository in a separate trial, meanwhile, also reported significantly reduced menstrual pain and related symptoms. Participants who used the CBD suppository generally reported less period pain, better mood and lower use of pain medications compared to subjects who underwent conventional treatment.

A study published this summer, meanwhile, found that more than half (57 percent) of patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain said cannabis was more effective than other analgesic medications, while 40 percent reported reducing their use of other painkillers since they began using marijuana.

Among those who said they used cannabis to manage pain, the most commonly used cannabinoid was CBD (39 percent), followed by a hybrid of multiple cannabinoids (20 percent). But almost a quarter (23 percent) said they were unaware of their cannabis’s composition.

Yet another study last year, published by the American Medical Association, found that the use of medical marijuana was associated with “significant improvements” in quality of life for people with chronic conditions like pain and insomnia—and those effects were “largely sustained” over time.

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Photo courtesy of Philip Steffan.