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Mortality Up for Individuals Who Need Hospital-Based Care for Cannabis Addiction

By Elana Gotkine HealthDay Reporter

Medically reviewed by Carmen Pope, BPharm. Last updated on Feb 12, 2025.

WEDNESDAY, Feb. 12, 2025 -- Individuals who require hospital-based care for cannabis use disorder (CUD) have an increased risk for premature death, according to a study published online Feb. 6 in JAMA Network Open.

Daniel T. Myran, M.D., M.P.H., from the University of Ottawa in Canada, and colleagues examined whether individuals receiving incident hospital-based care for CUD have an increased risk for death in a population-based retrospective cohort study. Overall and cause-specific mortality were compared between individuals with incident hospital-based CUD care and age- and sex-matched members of the general population. The matched analysis included 527,972 individuals; 106,994 had incident CUD.

The researchers found that 3.5 percent of individuals died within five years of incident hospital-based CUD care compared with 0.6 percent of matched general population controls. Individuals with incident hospital-based CUD care had an increased risk for death compared with the general population after adjustment for comorbid conditions (adjusted hazard ratio, 2.79). Relative to the general population, individuals with hospital-based CUD care had an increased risk for all investigated types of death and a particularly elevated risk for death by suicide, trauma, opioid poisoning, other drug poisonings, and lung cancer (adjusted hazard ratios, 9.70, 4.55, 5.03, 4.56, and 3.81, respectively). Individuals with hospital-based care for alcohol, stimulants, and opioids had a relatively increased risk for death within five years compared with those with hospital-based care for CUD (adjusted hazard ratios, 1.30, 1.69, and 2.19, respectively).

"The results of this cohort study suggest that individuals who require hospital-based care for a CUD are at an elevated risk of premature death," the authors write.

Two authors disclosed ties to the pharmaceutical industry.

Abstract/Full Text

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Disclaimer: Statistical data in medical articles provide general trends and do not pertain to individuals. Individual factors can vary greatly. Always seek personalized medical advice for individual healthcare decisions.

© 2025 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Posted February 2025

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