Steering the Integration of Medicinal Cannabis in Healthcare: The Cannabis & Health Research Initiative

March 27, 2025

At the March CMCR Investigators' Meeting, Ryan Vandrey, Ph.D., Professor at the Behavioral Pharmacology Research Unit (BPRU) at Johns Hopkins University, presented his ongoing research in the field of medicinal cannabis. Dr. Vandrey described the Cannabis & Health Research Initiative, a longitudinal observational study tracking adults newly initiating medicinal cannabis use through a patient registry. The study examines trends in cannabis product use, dosage, and associated health outcomes across different medical conditions, with the goal of assessing changes over time. Dr. Vandrey also highlighted the development of the Cannabis Use Questionnaire (CUQ), an instrument designed to capture detailed information on cannabis product types, chemotypes, doses, frequency, and other usage characteristics. Additionally, he presented a related project leveraging machine learning and natural language processing to systematically extract and analyze cannabis-related data from electronic medical records. Dr. Vandrey encouraged those interested in further details to visit cannabisandhealth.org.