A 2025 study by the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences seeks to better understand the increasing use of medical cannabis among pregnant women. Interestingly, the goal wasn't to determine the effects of cannabis. Instead, the study fills a different knowledge gap. Ozarks at Large's Aiden Dixon explains.
This type of study has existed for a while now, providing us information about substances that present a harm to pregnant women and their babies. But now, researchers have set their sights on cannabis. In an effort to understand more, Dr. Nahed El-Hassan, the study's first author and professor of pediatrics in the Division of Neonatology at UAMS, explains their approach.
"If you just think about years ago, whenever people start doing research about tobacco and alcohol use during the pregnancy, the question was not whether a woman used it, yes or no. The question is, how much did she use? When did she start using it? What are the products, and what are the pattern? So we believe now the cannabis research is starting to ask similar questions. We know that the question about the effect of any product given during the pregnancy is not simply the question of a yes or a no. We really need to know about the characteristics of these uses during the pregnancy, so we can start having better conversation about its effect on the moms and the baby."
That characteristic of use means a variety of things, marriage status, insurance status, race, age and more. When collecting data, a pattern of use began to emerge to the researchers. Dr. El-Hassan explains their finding.
"We noticed that 65%, or almost two-thirds of these women have been buying before they are pregnant, and they did continue to buy during the pregnancy. And as you dive more into the article, you will find that they have actually bought almost in every section, or what we call trimester, of the pregnancy. And these specific group of women tend to buy even higher amount of cannabis than those that start buying cannabis during the pregnancy."
An important question that should be asked is what is driving these women to purchase the medical cannabis? It's in looking for the answer that Dr. El-Hassan says the data caught them off guard.
"In our study, the number one reason to buy medical cannabis among pregnant women was post-traumatic stress disorder. We found that overall, the pregnancy in every single segment of pregnancy, we were surprised that the nausea during the pregnancy, which is typically a common reason in some literature why women can buy during the pregnancy, accounted for less than 6% of the cases. At the same time, there is no approved medical condition for cannabis use during the pregnancy. But if we are to compare the amount, the daily amount of THC, which is the psychoactive substance inside of cannabis, that these women were buying, it was substantially higher than what's approved in the non-pregnant woman."
Bradley Martin is a professor in the Division of Pharmaceutical Evaluation and Policy at UAMS, as well as a co-author on the study. He says that the advice he would give to pregnant women in a position to use cannabis during pregnancy would be to exercise caution.
"Because right now we don't know. There are studies that show that it could increase the risk of low birth weight and preterm babies. There are also studies that show that there is not at risk, unless there's a really clear, and there really just aren't. The data aren't in pregnant women. The data that support its use for clinical. So I would urge women extreme caution about continuing use. And if they are using or continuing to use medical cannabis, to try to use the lowest dose possible, and perhaps to even potentially wean off the medical cannabis."
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