ArticleDrug and alcohol review2018
Cannabis use is associated with lower rates of initiation of injection drug use among street-involved youth: A longitudinal analysis.
Article in Drug and alcohol review, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
22 citing papers in PubMed, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- Daily and near-daily cannabis use is associated with HIV viral load suppression in people living with HIV who use cocaine.AIDS care · 2021Trial
- Self-reported cannabis use to manage opioid withdrawal symptoms and reductions in opioid use among people who use unregulated opioids: a cross-sectional analysis.Journal of cannabis research · 2026Article
- The Association Between Self-Reported Anxiety and Retention in Opioid Agonist Therapy: Findings From a Canadian Pragmatic Trial.Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie · 2024Article
- Association of current substance use treatment with future reduced methamphetamine use in an observational cohort of men who have sex with men in Los Angeles.Journal of substance use and addiction treatment · 2024Observational
- Cannabis use to manage stimulant cravings among people who use unregulated drugs.Addictive behaviors · 2024Article
- Cannabis use to manage opioid cravings among people who use unregulated opioids during a drug toxicity crisis.The International journal on drug policy · 2023Article
- An answered call for aid? Cannabinoid clinical framework for the opioid epidemic.Harm reduction journal · 2023Review
- Article
- Frequent Cannabis Use Is Negatively Associated with Frequency of Injection Drug Use Among People Who Inject Drugs in a Canadian Setting.Cannabis and cannabinoid research · 2021Article
- High-intensity cannabis use and hospitalization: a prospective cohort study of street-involved youth in Vancouver, Canada.Harm reduction journal · 2021Article
- Cannabis Significantly Reduces the Use of Prescription Opioids and Improves Quality of Life in Authorized Patients: Results of a Large Prospective Study.Pain medicine (Malden, Mass.) · 2021Article
- Adolescent cannabis and tobacco use are associated with opioid use in young adulthood-12-year longitudinal study in an urban cohort.Addiction (Abingdon, England) · 2021Article
- Factors associated with health-related cannabis use intentions among a community sample of people who inject drugs in Los Angeles and San Francisco, CA 2016 to 2018.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2021Article
- Article
- Frequent Cannabis Use and Cessation of Injection of Opioids, Vancouver, Canada, 2005-2018.American journal of public health · 2020Article
- "Something that actually works": Cannabis use among young people in the context of street entrenchment.PloS one · 2020Article
- Children and Youth Who Use Cannabis for Pain Relief: Benefits, Risks, and Perceptions.Adolescent health, medicine and therapeutics · 2020Article
- Opioid agonist treatment scale-up and the initiation of injection drug use: A dynamic modeling analysis.PLoS medicine · 2019Article
- Hepatitis C transmission in young people who inject drugs: Insights using a dynamic model informed by state public health surveillance.Epidemics · 2019Article
- Medical cannabis patterns of use and substitution for opioids & other pharmaceutical drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and illicit substances; results from a cross-sectional survey of authorized patients.Harm reduction journal · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
INTRODUCTION AND
aimsStreet-involved youth are known to be at elevated risk of initiating injection drug use. However, the impact of so-called 'gateway' drugs, such as cannabis, on injection initiation is unknown. The objective of this study was to examine the association between cannabis use and initiation of injection drug use among a prospective cohort of street-involved youth in Vancouver, Canada. DESIGN AND
methodsData for this study were collected from the At-Risk Youth Study. From September 2005 to May 2015, participants aged 14-26 who reported illicit drug use were recruited into this open prospective cohort study. An extended Cox regression model with time-updated covariates was used to identify factors independently associated with injection initiation.
resultsDuring the study period, 481 street-involved youth were included in this study. Of these, 228 (47.4%) reported at least daily cannabis use, and 103 (21.4%) initiated injection drug use. In a multivariable analysis, ≥daily cannabis use was associated with slower rates of injection initiation (adjusted relative hazard 0.66, 95% confidence interval 0.45-0.98; P = 0.038). Sub-analyses revealed that cannabis use was negatively associated with initiation of injection stimulants but not initiation of injection opioids. DISCUSSION AND
conclusionsGiven the expansion of cannabis legalisation throughout North America, it is encouraging that cannabis use was associated with slower time to initiation of injection drug use in this cohort. This finding challenges the view of cannabis as a gateway substance that precipitates the progression to using harder and more addictive drugs.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.