April 8, 2025
A study showed that people who used cannabis under the age of 50 were over six times as likely to suffer a heart attack compared to those who didn’t use the drug.
A recent study revealed that marijuana users are more at risk of suffering a heart attack than people who do not use cannabis.
The American College of Cardiology (ACC) stated that a study showed that people who used cannabis, under the age of 50, were over six times as likely to suffer a heart attack compared to those who didn’t use the drug. It revealed a 50% increased risk among smokers of marijuana.
The results are from a study of over 4.6 million people published in JACC Advances and a meta-analysis of 12 previously published studies.
“Asking about cannabis use should be part of clinicians’ workup to understand patients’ overall cardiovascular risk, similar to asking about smoking cigarettes,” said Ibrahim Kamel, MD, clinical instructor at the Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine and internal medicine resident at St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Boston and the study’s lead author. “At a policy level, a fair warning should be made so that the people who are consuming cannabis know that there are risks.”
The outcome came from data from TriNetX, a global health research network that provides access to electronic medical records. Over an average follow-up of more than three years, people who used cannabis had more than a “sixfold increased risk of heart attack, fourfold increased risk of ischemic stroke, twofold increased risk of heart failure and threefold increased risk of cardiovascular death, heart attack or stroke.”
The people studied for this were all younger than 50 and had no significant cardiovascular comorbidities at baseline. The blood pressure and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels were all within a healthy range, and none of the participants had diabetes, partook in tobacco use, or had prior coronary artery disease.
Researchers pooled data from 12 published research studies that included over 75 million people for the meta-analysis’s results. Ten of the 12 studies were conducted in the United States, while one was performed in Canada and one in India. The average age of the people studied was 41 years old.
Seven of the studies showed a positive connection between cannabis use and heart attack incidence. Four showed no significant difference, while one showed a slightly negative association. After pooling and analyzing all the information from the studies, they found a significant positive association, with active cannabis users being 1.5 times as likely to suffer a heart attack than their non-cannabis-using counterparts.
“We should have some caution in interpreting the findings in that cannabis consumption is usually associated with other substances such as cocaine or other illicit drugs that are not accounted for,” Kamel said. “Patients should be forthcoming with their doctors and remember that we are their number one advocate and having the full story matters.”
RELATED CONTENT: Practitioners of African Traditional Religions Stood In Solidarity With Singer Summer Walker After She Was Trolled On Twitter
A study showed that cannabis users under the age of 50 were over six times as likely to suffer a heart attack compared to those who don’t Read More
