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Billboards about CBD are along local highways and storefronts have been popping up across the metro area.

When you walk into a CBD store there are rows of oils, edibles such as taffy and CBD products for your pets.

CBD is medically known as cannabidiol. It is a component of marijuana.

Dr. Gurpreet Padda is an anesthesiologist, pain physician and addictionlogist. He said there are two things to know about marijuana, “Marijuana certainly has a component which is called tetrahydrocannabinol which is THC, and then it has 60 to 80 other compounds in it which are cannabidiols. Marijuana is grown in two different ways, there is industrial hemp and then there is psychoactive marijuana.”

CBD is extracted from hemp plants so it does not have TCH which gives people a head high.

Padda said the human body naturally produces endocannabinoids. CBD activates the endocannabinoids in our body to produce a calmness. He said it can help people with pain, anxiety and sleep deprivation.

Padda uses CBD as a natural supplement to wean his patients off of high doses of pharmaceuticals. He said you can take CBD if you take other medications but talk to your doctor before trying the product.

Padda said CBD has been around for 8,000 years but we are just now seeing it because of recently passed legislation.

In 2014 a federal farm bill passed allowing the growth of industrial hemp. That’s when people started extracting CBD and researching its benefits.

In December of 2018, President Trump signed into law a federal farm bill clarifying that CBD is legal.

Padda said CBD is not federally regulated because it does not fall under the category of things that need regulation.