Marijuana Linked to Elevated Heart Attack Risk in Young Adults

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Association is stronger when marijuana use is frequent.

As the decriminalization of marijuana becomes more widespread, its use is on the rise among young adults. Yet, the effects on overall health have not been well studied, including how marijuana use affects cardiovascular health.

Now a large-scale study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal has found an association between recent marijuana use and increased risk of myocardial infarction (MI) in young people, ages 18 to 44 years. The association was strongest among those who used marijuana at least four times a month, primarily by smoking it. Users who vaped or ingested marijuana through baked goods or other edibles also had a higher incidence of MI compared with nonusers, but only those who smoked frequently showed elevated risk that was statistically significant.

The study was based on 2017 and 2018 behavioral risk survey data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It sought to evaluate known evidence of cardiovascular effects of marijuana in the context of MI risk for individual users. Marijuana’s chemical components can increase myocardial oxygen demand while simultaneously reducing blood flow to the myocardium. This cannabis-induced oxygen supply and demand mismatch, in the setting of myocardial […]

2021-12-07T11:34:08-05:00December 7th, 2021|Nursing, Public health|0 Comments
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Nurses at Center Stage: AJN’s Top 10 Blog Posts of 2014

By Jacob Molyneux, AJN senior editor/blog editor

Scanning electron micrograph of filamentous Ebola virus particles budding from an infected VERO E6 cell (35,000x magnification). Credit: NIAID Filamentous Ebola virus particles budding from an infected VERO E6 cell (35,000x magnification). Credit: NIAID

It’s unsurprising that some of our top blog posts this past year were about Ebola virus disease. But it’s worth noting that our clinical editor Betsy Todd, who is also an epidemiologist, cut through the misinformation and noise about Ebola very early on—at a time when many thoughtful people still seemed ill informed about the illness and its likely spread in the U.S.

Ebola is scary in itself, but fear was also spread by media coverage, some politicians, and, for a while, a tone-deaf CDC too reliant on absolutes in its attempts to reassure the public.

While the most dire predictions have not come true here in the U.S., it’s also true that a lot of work has gone into keeping Ebola from getting a foothold. A lot of people in health care have put themselves at risk to make this happen, doing so at first in an atmosphere of radical uncertainty about possible modes of transmission (uncertainty stoked in part by successive explanations offered as to how the nurses treating Thomas […]

2016-11-21T13:03:21-05:00December 12th, 2014|career, healthcare social media, infectious diseases, Nursing, nursing perspective|1 Comment
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Diabetes Plus Marijuana Plus Medical Errors Minus Nursing Blogs

What’s new in health care news this week?

Diabetes everywhere. There’s an entire Health Affairs issue devoted to the topic of “Confronting the Growing Diabetes Crisis.” It looks at many interrelated issues, such as the personal financial burden of having diabetes over the course of a lifetime, whether it’s best to put scarce health care resources into focusing on prevention or treatment, models for community-based lifestyle programs for those with type 2 diabetes, the positive effects of the Affordable Care Act on giving those with diabetes access to affordable health insurance and crucial care, genetic factors related to type 2 diabetes, and a great deal more. Inevitably, many of the articles focus on type 2 diabetes, which is so closely linked to America’s obesity epidemic.

Joint studies. SmokeCartel reported this week on a large government study showing that, whatever one believes about marijuana’s psychological effects or the efficacy of its various medical uses, long-term marijuana smoking—at least one joint per day, every day of the year—does not impair lung function or contribute to the development of COPD. Will this change anyone’s mind about whether this drug is evil, a panacea for all ills, or somewhere in between? Probably not.

Unreported harm. The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued a report last week stating that only 14% of medical errors and other events that harm Medicare patients were reported by hospital employees. The report calls for improving reporting systems and the […]

2017-07-10T16:46:39-04:00January 12th, 2012|Nursing|6 Comments
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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