Cannabis Promotes a Healthy Appetite

A strong and proper appetite is essential to good health; Cannabis can help to regulate and stimulate our desire to eat.

Healthy people do not need to think about when to eat - it is something that is instinctual. In fact, in most developed countries, there is a problem with an excessive appetite. The majority of people in Western countries are overweight. They are surrounded with a plethora of food and many have little in the way of self-control. Often, people lack the knowledge of what foods they should consume to promote the health of their individual body. The types of meals available may emphasize flavor, rather than nutritional profile. Eating is as simple as spending a small sum for an abundance of sweet calories. Sweet and salty flavors, alone or in combination, have been clinically shown to be as addictive as heroin.

Poor Appetite as a Result of Illness

Often, patients suffer from a disease that creates a poor appetite. When surrounded by food, such people have no desire to eat. These patients have been shown to have a neurological imbalance. The presence of a healthy appetite is itself an exhibition of a healthy nervous system. A poor appetite makes it difficult for the body to heal when the nutrients needed for repair are lacking.

The medical term for lack of appetite is cachexia, often referred to as 'wasting syndrome'. When a patient presents with cachexia, a doctor will generally consider the possibility of cancer, metabolic acidosis (from decreased protein synthesis and increased protein catabolism), certain infectious diseases (e.g., tuberculosis, AIDS) and some autoimmune disorders. Patients with anorexia also exhibit this symptom. The exact mechanism by which these diseases cause cachexia is poorly understood, but there is probably a role for inflammatory cytokines, such as tumor necrosis factor-alpha (colloquially, 'cachexin' or 'cachectin'), interferon gamma and interleukin 6 (IL-6), as well as the tumor-secreted proteolysis-inducing factor (PIF).

Tumor necrosis factor, or TNFα, is the target of new drugs generally referred to as 'biologics'. These drugs have been developed for the treatment of auto-immune diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn's disease. Cachexia physically weakens patients to a state of immobility, which stems from loss of appetite, asthenia and anemia; meanwhile, the response to standard treatment is usually poor. Cachexia decreases the prognosis for these patients because, without adequate nutritional building blocks, their bodies cannot repair themselves.

Carbohydrates, Lipids and Protein for Overall Health

Carbohydrates are used by the body for energy and movement, whereas lipids or fatty acids are required for neurological function because they are a component of nerve cell membranes. Lipids are also necessary for hormone synthesis.

Protein is the nutrient that is often neglected or misused, despite being the most important for body maintenance. The average person requires .75 grams of protein for every kilogram of body weight. Protein is important for tissue repair, muscle development and carrier molecules in the blood.

Cannabis-Cancer Connection

About fifty percent of all cancer patients suffer from cachexia. This figure rises to eighty percent in terminal cancer patients. In addition to increasing morbidity and mortality, aggravating the side effects of chemotherapy and reducing quality of life, cachexia is considered the immediate cause of death for twenty-two to forty percent of cancer patients. Symptoms of cancer cachexia include progressive weight loss and depletion of adipose tissue and skeletal muscle. Traditional treatment approaches such as appetite stimulants, 5-HT₃ antagonists ('setrons'), nutrient supplementation and COX-2 inhibitors have failed to demonstrate success in reversing the metabolic abnormalities seen in cancer cachexia.

Cannabis has long been known to be an appetite stimulant. The phenomenon of 'the munchies' has been written about and seen in movies and on television. As knowledge of the human brain's cannabinoid receptor system increases, scientists are gaining a better understanding of why Cannabis users cannot seem to stop eating.

Neurobiology of 'the Munchies'

According to a new study from researchers at Yale School of Medicine, this bottomless hunger seems to be caused by brain cells that normally make the body feel full by releasing alpha-Melanocyte-Stimulating Hormone, or α-MSH. However, when under the influence of marijuana, these same neurons make people feel extremely hungry instead!

For the study, recently published in the journal Nature, scientists examined what happens to neuron activity as Cannabis works on the brains of mice as a result of manipulating some of the cellular pathways that respond to marijuana use. Specifically, they wanted to see how the neurons that promote fullness respond to Cannabis, with the idea that they could be shut off, considering pot's reputation for promoting hunger. These pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) neurons that normally promote that feeling of fullness were activated by the Cannabis and yet promoted a hungry feeling instead. Scientists found that, when they selectively turned off the neurons, marijuana-triggered urges to eat died down significantly. When they boosted the activity in these same neurons, they saw an even stronger urge to snack.

Lead author Tamas L. Horvath, DVM, PhD, a professor of neurobiology and director of Cell Signaling and Neurobiology of Metabolism at Yale University School of Medicine, says that he and his colleagues concluded that these neurons were actually mediators of the Cannabis-induced munchies, not just found to promote satiety. "In the past seventeen years, it was assumed that the main role of these POMC neurons is to suppress appetite and eating," he said. "We show now that they can induce eating, as well, under certain circumstances."

The scientists were interested in the mechanism involved. How is it possible that a neuron that, at one moment, suppresses feeding, becomes the driver of feeding the next? "It's because the neurons switched the chemicals that they released," Horvath explains.

Cannabis seems to spark the release of opioids called beta-endorphin by the POMC neurons. The beta-endorphins appear to act upon receptors that promote eating behavior, essentially changing the function of the neuron cells.

Scientists are still curious as to how the neurons are able to change the chemicals they release and if these chemicals contribute to the high of Cannabis. "There are medical conditions, such as cancer cachexia, where people have no appetite, in part because over-activity in the POMC neurons suppress eating," Dr. Horvath elaborates. "Perhaps targeting these neurons specifically with new compounds could be more effective in reversing cachexia than the medications that are currently available."