WASHINGTON, DC—A medicinal liquid form of marijuana may show promise as a treatment for children with severe epilepsy that is not responding to other treatments, according to a study presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s 67th Annual Meeting. The study involved 213 people, ranging from toddlers to adults, with a median age of 11 who had severe epilepsy that did not respond to other treatments. Participants had Dravet syndrome, Lennox-Gastaut syndrome, or one of 10 other types of severe epilepsy.
The participants were given the drug cannabidiol, a component of marijuana that does not include the psychoactive part of the plant. The drug is a liquid taken daily by mouth. Participants all knew they were receiving the drug in the open-label study, which was designed to determine whether the drug was safe and well tolerated.
Researchers also measured the number of seizures participants had while taking the drug. For the 137 people who completed the 12-week study, the number of seizures decreased by an average of 54% from the beginning of the study to the end. Among the 23 patients with Dravet syndrome who finished the study, the number of convulsive seizures had gone down by 53% by the end of the trial. For the 11 patients with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome who finished the study, there was a 55% reduction in the number of atonic seizures.
A total of 12 patients, or 6%, stopped taking the drug because of side effects. Side effects that occurred in more than 10% of participants included drowsiness (21%), diarrhea (17%), tiredness (17%), and decreased appetite (16%).
Study author Orrin Devinsky, MD, of New York University Langone Comprehensive Epilepsy Center in Manhattan, said that these are early findings and larger, placebo-controlled, double-blind trials are needed to measure the effectiveness of the drug. “So far, there have been few formal studies on this marijuana extract,” Dr. Devinsky said. “These results are of great interest, especially for the children and their parents who have been searching for an answer for these debilitating seizures.”
The study was supported by GW Pharmaceuticals.
