A retrospective clinical study conducted at the Wholeness Center, a large mental health clinic in Colorado, has recently suggested that administration of oral cannabidiol (CBD) in addition to routine psychiatric care may help reduce symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in adult patients. In this case series, CBD was prescribed for 11 PTSD patients at flexible dosing and in the form of either oral capsule or oral spray over an 8-week period. PTSD symptom severity was assessed before treatment began as well as every 4 weeks by the patient-completed PTSD checklist questionnaires.
At the end of the study, 10 out of 11 patients demonstrated a reduction in PTSD symptom severity, as evidenced by questionnaire scores lower at the eighth week than at initial baseline. More specifically, the mean total score decreased by 28%, from a mean pretreatment score of 51.82 down to 37.14 after eight consecutive weeks of CBD therapy. Additionally, CBD was generally well tolerated, and no patients discontinued medication due to side effects. Given these results, together with the fact that CBD doesn’t produce the high sensation like other major components of cannabis, the medical researchers proposed that it can be incorporated into PTSD treatment regimen as a supplement to current drugs and therapies.