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Marijuana and MVP

Hi, I'm 18, 5'8", 120 lbs. I was diagnosed with mitral valve prolapse a few years ago. Back then it was mild regurgitation. My last check up (almost a year ago) the regurgitation went to mild-to-moderate. The only limitation my doctor told me were that I cannot do weight lifting or excercises that strain my heart, but I can do things such as arobics, running, swimming.

I started smoking marijuana a little over a year ago and only really had about enough to increase my heartrate a few times. Quit for a few months, then started smoking it again the past couple months, but haven't even been smoking enough to get very high or much increase in heartrate. Firstly I started it for the high, but have learned of the many bennafits it has medicinally so I have mostly been using as a sleep and appetite aid. I am also very sensative to it so I have been able to only need doses of about 1/20 of a gram each time. In total, I have probably only ever smoked about 3-5 grams since last year.

My main concern is, is cannabis bad for MVP. I know that carbon monoxide with smoking is but I have pretty much stopped smoking and am thinking about resorting to other methods such such as tinctures, eating, etc. But I still do not know, will THC increasing my heartrate and all still be bad for my condition?
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Avatar universal
I would like to add that few prescription or OTC medications we take are without unintended effects.  Any time we consider taking medication, we are balancing potential help with potential harm.  The problem with marijuana is that because of its legal status, there are few human-subjects studies to evaluate its risk/benefit ratio in various medical situations.

Probably because of human subjects issues, the recently popular announcement by Missouri has not been able to establish a scientific base.  The present report advances hypotheses comparing lung damage from marijuana smoke versus cigarette smoke, but little proof.  A great deal of supporting research will be required before the hypotheses are proven.  

Some of the problems that will have to be cleared up are:

--It is highly speculative (e.g., it includes guesses as to how much, if any, longer an inhaled lungful of marijuana smoke is held in the lungs, and how much if any additional effect on lung tissue results from any such extended exposure; to be useful in obtaining results, these guesses have to be measured and quantified);

--It compares apples and oranges (e.g., filtered cigarettes with unfiltered joints, to claim the marijuana smoke—that is, the unfiltered smoke---is more dangerous, a well known result from comparing filtered and unfiltered cigarettes; it deals with the method of smoking and does not compare tobacco and marijuana);

--It enhances the guesses of harm from marijuana smoking by an unrelated factor, concurrent cigarette smoking (whereas controlling for separate variables is essential if science is to obtain meaningful scientific results, that is, if scientists are to be sure that they are actually measuring what they think they are measuring, the effects of the variable being studied.  There is no evidence yet that a quantity of the combination is more dangerous than an equal quantity of one or the other alone);  

--It stacks variables (in this case, asserts that the risk of combined variables is the sum of the risks of separate variables, a result which would have to be tested by scientific research to know if it is true, and which, in fact, it rarely is);

--It downplays or entirely omits highly significant factors that seem to contradict its message (for example, the Missouri report stresses its belief that a single joint is more harmful than a single cigarette, and extrapolates from that a claim that marijuana use is more dangerous than tobacco use.  It fails to acknowledge that a smoker smokes every day, often 20 to 60 cigarettes a day, while most marijuana users smoke only occasionally, and seldom use more than one or two joints at a time).

As I said above, there are special problems in obtaining research data about illegal drug use, so lack of adequate data is understandable.  I’m both hopeful and grateful that the medical breakthroughs we depend on for our health are more thoroughly and scientifically studied!  
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21064 tn?1309308733
That's a good question for your cardiologist.  I don't really know if MJ is harmful with respect to the MVP, but I do know that it has been proven to have a negative on the heart and lungs.  It alters HR, BP and blood supply.....It would be best to find healthy alternatives to help you sleep or control diet.

According to the Missouri Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse:

"Marijuana use increases the heart rate as much as 50 percent, depending on the amount of THC. It can cause chest pain in people who have a poor blood supply to the heart - and it produces these effects more rapidly than tobacco smoke does.

Scientists believe that marijuana can be especially harmful to the lungs because users often inhale the unfiltered smoke deeply and hold it in their lungs as long as possible. Therefore, the smoke is in contact with lung tissues for long periods of time, which irritates the lungs and damages the way they work. Marijuana smoke contains some of the same ingredients in tobacco smoke that can cause emphysema and cancer. In addition, many marijuana users also smoke cigarettes; the combined effects of smoking these two substances creates an increased health risk.

Marijuana smoke has been found to contain more cancer-causing agents than is found in tobacco smoke."

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