Cannabis and Cancer Immunotherapy: Important Notes for Myeloma Patients

Much is being written these days about the use of cannabis in cancer treatment. There is already some acknowledgment of the palliative effects of cannabis for cancer patients, especially as an agent that may alleviate chemo induced nausea. There is also some very early/emerging research on the potential curative effect of cannabis on certain cancers. Fact is, however, that there is no understanding on the interplay between cancer and cannabis.

There is, however, some recent guidance from a paper published in the Journal of the Society of Translational Oncology. This paper presents the results of a retrospective study of patients who used a treatment regimen of the compound nivolumab (alone) vs. nivolumab + cannabis. You may not be familiar with this compound as it is not used in hematological malignancies, but it belongs to the ‘monoclonal antibody’ class of immunotherapy compounds, as is e.g. Darzalex (daratumumab) – a drug that is seeing expanded use in the treatment of multiple myeloma.

The main conclusion reached from this study is that the combined use of nivolumab plus cannabis shortened the time to relapse compared to nivolumab alone, though the statistics for overall survival and progression free survial were the same for both treatment regimens. The authors of the paper conclude the following :

‘Implications for Practice. Although the data are retrospective and a relation to cannabis composition was not detected, this information can be critical for cannabis users and indicates that caution is required when starting immunotherapy.’

You may wish to be aware of this ‘red flag’ before stopping by your corner medical cannabis shop and then stopping by your local treatment clinic for your immunotherapy. Chances are that you will most likely be better off stopping by Dunkin’ Donuts first and then the clinic. Or, just go straight to the clinic.