Kind: captions
Language: en
(slow music)
- [Narrator] Neuroscientists Staci Gruber
has been running clinical trials
following cannabis use
for a range of conditions.
- How's the anxiety?
And in all honesty, how is it?
- [Narrator] Today, Gruber
is meeting with Erin,
a graduate student enrolled in a study,
testing CBD as a potential
treatment for reducing anxiety.
CBD is one of the main
components found in cannabis,
but unlike THC,
CBD is not psychoactive and
not known to be intoxicating.
- I started not getting
full panic attacks,
but like little baby, like half.
- [Narrator] Erin was once
outgoing, even performed onstage.
But in high school, panic
attacks became unmanageable.
- A panic attack is essentially
your fight or flight system
going out of control.
(slow music)
- They are a completely
unexpected tidal wave of events
- My heart's beating,
I'm hot and dizzy and nauseous.
- [Staci] They can't breathe,
they're sweating.
You often hear about people
who go to the emergency room.
- We would get these
phone calls night and day.
Her mind just raced.
Is she gonna fall down?
Is she gonna faint?
Was she gonna die.
- So imagine this multiple times a week,
sometimes multiple times a day.
I think you would do almost
anything to try to prevent
that from happening.
- [Narrator] Then Erin began
taking a cannabis extract
high-end CBD during a part of
this study where both patients
and clinicians know which
treatment is being administered
known as the open-label phase.
- This is the very first clinical trial
that looks at a whole plant
full spectrum product,
which means it has
everything from the plant,
we haven't pulled anything out
and for Erin and for the
majority of our patients,
at least in the open-label
phase of this study,
we saw very dramatic improvements
in their symptoms of
anxiety relatively quickly.
- It was striking.
It was profound
and it was within two
weeks of her starting
the clinical study.
This is a whole new kid.
Someone who was very reticent
to go off on your own,
but walk down the street
on her own or to go try
something new,
was all of a sudden
sending pictures of places
she was exploring and feeling just better.
- [Narrator] Until all
the data are analyzed
from a double-blinded clinical trial,
Gruber can't rule out a placebo effect.
And more research is needed
to see how patients respond
after long-term use of CBD.
But Erin sees a profound difference.
- I have reached for my CBD
in the middle of an active panic attack.
And as someone who normally
would have reached for a benzo
and knows that feeling,
I can say that the CBD didn't take it away
as much as a benzodiazepine,
but I definitely felt relief.
And I can't tell you the last
time I had a panic attack
to be totally honest.
(slow music)