As of now, there is no truly effective form of treatment or cure for Parkinson’s disease, a disorder that results in the degeneration of vital nerve cells in the brain and that typically creates a number of motor disabilities in patients.

The standard method for helping patients deal with Parkinson’s disease involves taking pharmaceutical drugs that increase dopamine levels in the brain.

While this offers some immediate help in managing the condition, it also can increase the presence of certain neurotoxic substances that sometimes actually speed up the progression of the disease.

There is a growing body of scientific research pointing to the ways that cannabis might be an all natural form of medicine for treating Parkinson’s disease that’s safer and more effective than anything pharmaceutical companies can come up with.

In particular, research has begun to emerge showing that a component of this plant known as cannabidiol (CBD), and which does not have the controversial psychoactive properties associated with tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), may have a wide range of therapeutic applications, including treating conditions that are refractory to conventional drug-based approaches.

This means that, once again, cannabis has emerged as a promising alternative to the pharmaceutical drugs so heavily prescribed by doctors but that too often have unwanted side effects.

So far, there have been a number of studies aimed at discovering CBD’s effects on animal models of Parkinson’s disease.

Adding to these animal studies, a handful of key studies of CBD’s effects on Parkinson’s disease in humans have also been documented.

These results, taken together with the results from the animal models of Parkinson’s disease, indicate that CBD may provide a drug alternative in Parkinson’s disease patients.

The findings from this collection of studies are directly in line with another report, published this fall in the Canadian Journal of Public Health, that found cannabis to be a far superior form of medicine than prescription opioids.