LeafCann Adelaide cannabis factory in dementia project
It's the natural weed with a bad rap, but SA-based Australian-first research could prove cannabis’s healing effects may improve the lives of those living with dementia.
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Cannabis to help treat behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia will be the focus of the nation’s largest medicinal cannabis factory to be built in Adelaide’s south.
Work on the $50 million cultivation and manufacturing plant in the Onkaparinga Council has been stalled by up to six months by the COVID-19 pandemic.
LeafCann chief executive Elisabetta Faenza told The Advertiser the company was in discussions with the National Institute of Health Research in the UK regarding feasibility studies on medicinal cannabis and dementia research – and with Aberdeen University to progress a pilot study.
Ms Faenza said medicinal cannabis could aid in the treatment of behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, ranging from confusion, anxiety, appetite loss, insomnia, repetitive movements, violent outbursts, and memory loss.
A preclinical study commissioned by LeafCann, involving researchers from UniSA, found four overseas studies involving medicinal cannabis had recorded “significant improvement” in the neuropsychiatric scores of people living with dementia.
“This could … allow us to significantly improve people’s lives, as well as the lives of their carers and family who are understandably very distressed by the progress of the disease,” Ms Faenza told The Advertiser.
“If medicinal cannabis was found to lower the rate of polypharmacy (multiple medication prescription) and use of chemical or other restraints for patients with this condition, this would be a major win,” she said.
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“Should there also be evidence during this trial that the specific medicinal cannabis formulation also reverses the progress of the disease, we would certainly be keen to then pursue that line of investigation.
Adelaide Hills GP Sinclair Bode said he had been prescribing medicinal cannabis for a handful of patients living with dementia in recent years to help reduce anxiety and aggressive behaviour.
“It is much safer than many of the medications we use,” Dr Bode said. “It also improves focus.”
By 2050, it is predicted that 900,000 Australians will be living with dementia – almost double today’s 459,000 cared for by nearly 1.6 million people, much of it unpaid.
Find out how LeafCann CEO Elisabetta Faenza has come to be our Queen of Green in SA Weekend