CHS usually starts after years of using marijuana many times a week. Initial symptoms are feeling sick to the stomach, belly pain and the feeling like you may throw up. After about years of chronic marijuana use, patients begin to have a strong feeling of sickness, throwing up, and belly pain.
Causes and Risk Factors
CBT can help address the underlying reasons for cannabis use and provide strategies for managing cravings and avoiding relapse. Medical tests and examinations are often used to rule out other potential causes. These might include blood tests, imaging studies like CT scans or ultrasounds, and sometimes even endoscopies. It’s like going through a full-body car wash, but for your insides. But it’s also important to acknowledge the positive uses of marijuana, Camilleri said.
Are there complications of cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome?
It’s the genetic lottery, and if you have CHS, you’ve won a prize you definitely didn’t want. Patients are often diagnosed with the syndrome based on the way they treat their own symptoms. Typically, patients can only find relief from intense and persistent nausea by taking hot baths or showers. Cannabis can both induce and subdue vomiting, a paradox doctors don’t fully understand, Camilleri said.
Supportive Care with Fluid and Electrolyte Replacement
The what is chs Rome IV criteria provide some objectivity to help with the diagnosis by placing CHS under the heading of functional gut-brain disorders, and consider it as a variant of CVS (Table 2). Venkatesan et al have proposed a new criterion for CHS with the use of clinical features, cannabis use patterns including duration and frequency, and symptoms resolution after at least 6 months of cessation 48. However, questions remain about the dosage of cannabis, individual and genetic susceptibility, abstinence period and the inclusion of abdominal pain as a criterion. The clinical effects of volume depletion dominate complications related to CHS. Reports of severe volume depletion resulting in acute kidney injury and severe electrolyte disturbances with rhabdomyolysis have been reported in the literature 49.
The importance of quitting cannabis with CHS
- CHS is also underdiagnosed because people sometimes use marijuana to suppress nausea and vomiting.
- Over time, the symptoms will go away completely unless you start to use again.
- You may need to see a gastroenterologist, a doctor who specializes in the digestive tract, for a proper diagnosis.
- As people with CHS often only consult their doctors during the hyperemesis stage, there is a lack of knowledge regarding the treatment of people during the prodromal stage.
- It’s like going through a full-body car wash, but for your insides.
Symptoms of CHS typically come on several years after the start of chronic marijuana use. But not everyone who uses marijuana long-term experiences CHS. Acupuncture/acupressure has been used to treat nausea symptoms successfully. However, there have been no specific studies for this alternative practice in treating CHS.
How can I prevent CHS?
People in the hyperemetic phase can take up to 12 hot showers or baths during the day to relieve symptoms. The hot temperatures may provide some relief as they affect your hypothalamus, the part of your brain that regulates both vomiting and your internal body temperature. Experts know that, usually, cannabis sends anti-nausea signals to the brain. But in rare cases, after continued and heavy cannabis use, signaling to the cannabis receptors in the digestive tract goes wrong and causes nausea and vomiting. It just isn’t clear exactly why some people get CHS and others do not.
What are the possible complications of cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome?
If you think you have CHS or cannabis use disorder, talk to a healthcare provider. Cannabinoid Hyperemesis Syndrome (CHS) is a medical condition characterized by repeated and severe bouts of vomiting in long-term, regular cannabis users. Despite marijuana’s known anti-nausea properties, CHS presents an unusual paradox. This guide provides an in-depth look at CHS, including its causes, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention. They should also have the freedom and empowerment to speak up to other team members if they feel that this may be getting overlooked in the diagnostic picture. Since the only treatment is the removal of the offending agent, accurate diagnosis is the only portal to actual management.
What are the symptoms of cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome?
- The recent body of research recognizes that patients with CHS impose a burden on the healthcare systems.
- If cannabis use is resumed, symptoms of CHS can return, often heralding a return of the hyperemesis many weeks or months later.
- Typical antiemetics such as ondansetron, commonly known as Zofran, have often been found ineffective at suppressing nausea caused by CHS.
It’s like trying to develop a vaccine for a virus – challenging, but potentially game-changing. Stopping cannabis use is the most effective way to prevent CHS episodes and allow the body to heal. It’s like hitting the reset button on your endocannabinoid system. Cannabis use can be habit-forming, and some people use it for medical reasons.
But, researchers do know only cannabis users get this condition. With the expanding acceptance and legalization of cannabis worldwide, healthcare providers face a crucial imperative to accurately identify CHS amidst a sea of similar clinical presentations. The effectiveness of these agents is limited, which is also a clue for the diagnosis of CHS. If traditional agents fail in controlling the symptoms, haloperidol can be tried, but it has been used with limited success. Our patient did not respond to traditional antiemetics, but responded well to a small dose of lorazepam.
Treatment and Management
If the patient quits cannabis consumption, vomiting due to CHS largely subsides. It’s possible that with lower amounts or lower frequency, patients might be able to use amphetamine addiction treatment cannabis again, but the science is unclear. Interestingly, patients dealing with Cyclical Vomiting Syndrome (CVS) also frequently mention this behavior. Yet, with the evolving comprehension of CHS, there is a likelihood that some cases attributed to CVS might actually be undiagnosed instances of CHS, marking it as pathognomonic. This underscores the critical need to correlate symptoms with cannabis consumption, ruling out overlapping diagnoses that could be mistaken for CVS.
