what is the connection between marijuana and schizophrenia?

I have a lot of personal experience in this area.    In a clinical sense, there is some evidence to suggest that marijuana use may be a triggering factor in the onset of schizophrenia. ( along with stress, genetic factors and so on )

    In my own life , I was doing a lot of marijuana around the time I was first diagnosed about thirty years ago.     I also know that for the first ten or fifteen years of my treatment I was using marijuana as self -medication to ease the problems that were not being solved at that time.

   Marijuana is a psychologically addictive drug and can cause real problems if it is used by someone diagnosed with schizophrenia. Your health-care professional has more information on this topic for you .

 

Sincerely,

 

Don Fraser

Again I hate to be self promotional but in my recent book on the topic, I review all the studies on the link between marijuana and the onset of schizophrenia (http://www.cuttingforstone.com). It is quite controversial and a lot of people think that marijuana use and alcohol are forms of self medication. The disease is there and the person uses pot to try to deal with them.