Introduction:

Cannabinoids can be a valid option for the treatment of chronic non-cancer pain, according to the studies published to date and our clinical experience.

Objectives:

To evaluate the clinical benefit of medicinal cannabis preparations (MCPs) for chronic non-cancer pain in patients seen at the Endocannabinology Clinic of Uruguay (CEDU).

Method:

Descriptive, observational, longitudinal study of a population treated at a private healthcare center. This involves a cohort of 438 patients who spontaneously consulted at CEDU from September 2016 to March 2020. The reason for consultation was chronic non-cancer pain that did not respond to standard treatment.

Results:

in the studied cohort, women prevailed and accounted for 74% of patients. Average age was 69 years old and 95% of them sought care within the private healthcare system. Most women had completed secondary school education. The most frequent type of pain was osteoarticular pain. The most used chemovar of Medicinal Cannabis (MC) was 5% cannabidiol (CBD), showing a favorable treatment response in reducing pain levels and the discontinuation or reduction of opioid and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) usage. Few and mild adverse effects (AE) were observed in the vast majority of patients. Twelve patients (less than 3%) discontinued the treatment.

Conclusions:

This retrospective study demonstrated a reduction in pain level of 3.14 (p-value ≤ 0.0001) indicating that MC could be an option for the treatment of non-oncological chronic pain.

Further studies are needed to demonstrate the effectiveness and safety of cannabinoids. This depends on many factors (laws facilitating accessibility to a variety of medical-grade MC products, incentives for science and research). Nevertheless, we can assert that the presented results are promising in consideration of their therapeutic potential.

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