Republished from: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/marijuana-edibles-helped-dying-holocaust-survivor-battle-alzheimers/story?id=59637115
By FORD VOX Dec 9, 2018, 1:50 PM ET
A Massachusetts family’s experience giving marijuana edibles
to their dying patriarch is set to kick off a desperately needed investigation
into how cannabis might treat some of the more troubling symptoms of
Alzheimer’s disease, a condition that affects 5.7 million Americans.
Alexander Spier spent three years during the Holocaust in
Auschwitz and other concentration camps as punishment not only for his heritage
but also because he had fought against the Nazis with the Dutch Underground.
Spier was eventually able to emigrate to the U.S. from Holland in 1945, where
he began working as a watchmaker and jeweler before moving into real estate and
construction.
Today, Spier’s family runs the multimillion-dollar company
that he built, Mayfair Realty & Development Corporation. They’ve also
carried on his tradition of philanthropy through the Spier Family Foundation,
which has supported a variety of medical research through different hospitals
in the past.
Harvard’s McLean Psychiatric Hospital is one of those
institutions supported by the Spiers. And now, it’s partnering with the family
to research the potential benefits of medical marijuana on Alzheimer’s and
other forms of dementia.
Spier died of complications related to Alzheimer’s in 2017.
His final two years were characterized by rapid decline, which his son, Greg
Spier, described as torturous.
“It was the most difficult time of my life, having to see
him deteriorate. My father spoke five languages, and he was speaking Dutch and
German, reliving the three concentration camps he survived,” Greg Spier said,
recalling how his father often pleaded, “Where is my mother?” in German.
Alex’s story is typical for many of the 50 percent of
Alzheimer’s patients who develop so-called neuropsychiatric symptoms of the
condition, characterized by agitation, anxiety, depression, psychosis, wandering
and pacing.
For Alex Spier, the symptoms became too much to continue
with assisted living, where he managed to escape twice. But even after his
family moved him to a dedicated memory care program in Florida, where he was
given supplementary care and a private attendant, his condition progressed.
Doctors resorted to aggressive medications, including a
variety of antipsychotic and antiseizure drugs, but the sedation they caused —
side effects of their use — only seemed to worsen his agitation and delirium.
In a decision that at first divided the family, Greg Spier
and a niece who lives in Colorado decided to try marijuana edibles. The
last-ditch effort involved Greg Spier, along with a private assistant, feeding
his dad granola bar marijuana edibles up to four times a day during his final
three months.
“The only thing that seemed to give him any reprieve was the
marijuana,” Greg Spier said, adding that it allowed his dad to sleep.
According to Dr. Brent Forester, chief of the division of
geriatric psychiatry at McLean, the science of medical cannabis for dementia is
far behind what families like the Spiers are already doing on their own. Alex
Spier wasn’t his patient, but Forester was fascinated to learn about the
family’s success with edibles last year.
Forester’s own research involves the synthetic THC drug
dronabinol, an FDA-approved medicine for chemotherapy-related nausea and
AIDS-associated weight loss, which can cost $400 to $1,500 without insurance
coverage.
Forester and his colleagues have published promising study
results after giving dronabinol to agitated and distressed dementia patients,
and are currently recruiting for a larger multicenter trial funded by the
National Institute on Aging.
It’s true that in teens and young adults, frequent marijuana
use is associated with a lower IQ and an increased risk of psychiatric
disorders. In adults who have been using it since adolescence, it has been
found to erode memory and visuospatial skills.
But these negative impacts could be limited to young brains
that are exposed to marijuana for extended periods, and they might not be true
for people who begin in older age. When a team of German and Israeli
researchers gave low doses of THC to old mice, for example, learning and memory
improved to a level similar to young mice.
When these scientists examined the brain tissue, they found
that the mice given the THC had more complex hippocampal connections. By
contrast, THC worsened brain function in young mice.
More promising for Alzheimer’s disease, animal research has
also shown that THC may increase the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, just like
the FDA-approved dementia drug Aricept. THC also appears to slow the
accumulation of amyloid beta plaques, the hallmark characteristic of
Alzheimer’s.
Forester and his colleagues theorize that these protective
effects — which result from the use of cannabinoid drugs — might reduce the
risk of the abnormal behaviors associated with dementia. However, only time and
research will tell.
The Spier Family Foundation is eager to support this work
and is giving private dollars to fund it. Federal funding is difficult to
obtain with marijuana still being classified as a schedule I controlled
substance, defined as “having no currently accepted medical use and a high
potential for abuse.”
There are currently no FDA-approved drugs that treat the
behavioral symptoms of dementia, which can become the most distressing aspect
of the condition. Current drugs that are given to Alzheimer’s patients, such as
antipsychotics and benzodiazepines, can even make their symptoms worse due to
side effects, Forester said.
“We really need to open up opportunities to study medical
marijuana for this particular indication. I think there’s enough evidence from
the synthetic THC as well as anecdotal reports that it’s certainly worth
studying,” Forester said.
The Spier Family Foundation’s willingness to fund this work
is extraordinarily important, Forester said, adding that he was hopeful the
medical marijuana industry will see the value in supporting such research as
well.
Dr. Ford Vox practices
rehabilitation medicine at the Shepherd Center in Atlanta and contributes
analysis to the ABC News Medical Unit.
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