UK medical cannabis registry: A clinical outcome analysis of medical cannabis therapy in chronic pain patients with and without co‐morbid sleep impairment

Summary & key facts

This study looked at 1,139 chronic pain patients in a UK medical cannabis registry and compared those with poor sleep to those without. Both groups reported improvements in pain, quality of life, anxiety, and other measures over 1, 3, 6 and 12 months after starting cannabis‐based medicines. People with sleep problems showed bigger gains in reported pain severity and sleep quality than those without sleep problems, but the study design cannot prove the medicines caused the changes.

Key facts:

• The study included 1,139 patients: 517 (45.4%) were classified as sleep impaired and 622 (54.6%) as sleep unimpaired.
• Patients completed measures at baseline and 1, 3, 6, and 12 months using SQS, GAD‑7, EQ‑5D‑5L, Brief Pain Inventory (BPI), and SF‑MPQ‑2.
• The sleep‑impaired group showed statistically significant improvements in all patient‑reported outcome measures at each follow‑up (p < 0.010).
• The sleep‑unimpaired group also showed improvements on most measures (p < 0.050), but not on the single‑item sleep quality scale (SQS) or some EQ‑5D‑5L domains (self‑care and anxiety/depression) where p > 0.050.
• Compared with the unimpaired group, the sleep‑impaired group had greater improvements in BPI pain severity (p < 0.050) and SQS sleep score (p < 0.001) at all follow‑ups.
• A total of 2,817 adverse events were self‑reported across both groups, and the difference between groups was not statistically significant (p = 0.197).
• The authors note this was an observational registry study, not a randomized trial, and say randomized controlled trials are needed to test whether cannabis‑based medicines actually cause the observed changes.

Abstract

Whilst these results show promise for the effects of CBMPs on CP, they must be examined within the limitations of the study design. These findings provide further evidence to support the design of subsequent randomized controlled trials to verify causality between CBMPs and pain outcomes.

Topics

Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research Sleep and related disorders Sleep and Wakefulness Research

Categories

Health Sciences Medicine Pharmacology

Tags

Anxiety Brief Pain Inventory Chronic pain Cohort Cohort study Computer science Depression (economics) Economics Environmental health Internal medicine Macroeconomics McGill Pain Questionnaire Medicine Operating system Physical therapy Population Prospective cohort study Psychiatry Sleep (system call) Visual analogue scale