Posttraumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD) was very much one of the centers of attention during the last years of psychological research. Posttraumatic stress disorders may develop when  people are exposed to life-threatening situations – such as natural disasters, assassinations, sexual abuse or war events. It is estimated that up to 50% of all U.S. soldiers returning from war zones are affected by forms of post-traumatic stress disorder. But PTSD is difficult to treat and usually requires a lengthy therapy, even though various pharmacological approaches using the stress hormone cortisol, beta-blockers include Propranolo [1] and psychotherapy (the special trauma therapy methods based on hypnotherapy like EMDR, or combined approaches such as the one by Luise Reddemann) brought significant progress.

New hope now comes from a totally unexpected direction: in a study done together with graduate student E. Ganon-Elazar and published in the Journal of Neuroscience [2] it was shown that the activation of cannabinoid receptors in the basolateral nuclear complex of the amygdala (BLA) compensates the  effect of stress during conditioning. Many years ago, the pharmacist at the Jerusalem University, Rafael Meshulam, already published similar positive effects when he administered traumatized mice, now his results could be confirmed in trials with rats. Following a decision of the Supreme Court of Croatia in an appeal against a man who had fought in the war in Yugoslavia and was since then suffering from PTSD, war veterans suffering from post traumatic stress disorder may now even now grow marijuana for self-treatment. [3]

(Sources: [1] Andrea Naica-Loebell: “Die Pille für das Vergessen” in: telepolis Online-Magazin, 08/2005; [2] Ganon-Elazar, E. & Akirav, I. (2009), Cannabinoid receptor activation in the basolateral amygdala blocks the effects of stress on the conditioning and extinction of inhibitory avoidance. Journal of Neuroscience, 29(36):11078-11088; [3] Der Standard 04.06.2009; Image credit: Cannabisculture.com)