2025/11/08 by Deepak Cyril D’Souza, Prakash Chandra Gupta, Ashley M. Schnakenberg Martin +2 · 1 voice
Medicine · Psychology · #Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research #Psychedelics and Drug Studies #Substance Abuse Treatment and Outcomes
paper · pdf · doi:10.1177/25785125251394916
openalex publication_date 2025/11/08 · openalex created_date 2025/11/08 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/15
Adults aged 50 and older represent one of the fastestgrowing groups of cannabis users.Past-month cannabis use among adults ‡65 years increased from <1% in 2005 to 7.0% in 2023. 1 The 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that 10.8% of adults over 50 and 7.1% of adults ‡65 reported past-year use. 2 This trend parallels expanding legalization and commercialization, reduced stigma, and changing perceptions of cannabis's riskbenefit profile.Given the lack of consensus, in this commentary, we refer to older adults as those older than 50 years of age. 3 Aging is associated with changes in brain function, sleep, psychomotor performance, cardiovascular health, drug metabolism, and polypharmacy.These changes may alter how cannabis and its principal constituents, THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol) and CBD (cannabidiol), affects older individuals. 4However, most cannabis research has focused on young adults, leaving older populations underrepresented.Cannabis contains several major and minor cannabinoids, terpenoids, and flavonoids in varying proportions.While other constituents of cannabis contribute to the overall effects of cannabis, their psychoactive and cognitive impact is relatively minor in comparison to the effects of D-9-THC, the principal psychoactive constituent of cannabis.A recent meta-analysis of adult human clinical trials showed that acute consumption of CBD was not associated with significant cognitive or psychomotor impairment on objective neurocognitive tests when compared to placebo. 5 Furthermore, other cannabinoids present in cannabis are usually present at levels that would have limited