Myocardial infarction (MI) is commonly referred to as a “heart attack”. As marijuana use increases worldwide, more opportunities have arisen to determine what kind of effect it will have on those unfortunate enough to have a MI, or heart attack. This study set out to determine if the usage of marijuana had positive or negative effects on those patients. The results are surprising.
Hospital records from 8 states between 1994 and 2013 were screened for diagnosis of MI. Out of 1,273,897 patients with MI, 3,854 reported use of marijuana (cannabis), and their outcomes were compared with those that did not use marijuana.
Interestingly, marijuana users were significantly less likely to die, experience shock, or require an intraaortic balloon pump placement. Marijuana users were slightly more likely to be placed on mechanical ventilation (short term). The authors were surprised that marijuana use did not create a less favorable outcome, and stated positively that it was associated with less in-hospital death after a heart attack. The short abstract is found here.
