Cannabis Exposure During Pregnancy Leads To Abnormal Brain Development In Infants

Cannabis exposure during pregnancy can be linked to abnormal brain structure in children. Based on a new study in Biological Psychiatry, prenatal exposure to cannabis can cause thicker prefrontal cortex, an area in the brain that is responsible for decision making, a working memory and complex recognition.

The cannabis study lead author Dr. Hanan El Marroun of the Erasmus University Medical Center in The Netherlands stated the importance of the research, given that the use of cannabis during pregnancy is very common. She also added that there is very little knowledge about the possible effects of cannabis exposure during pregnancy, including the brain development later in life.

The use of cannabis during pregnancy has been estimated to occur in two up to 13 percent  of women worldwide.  In previous studies, the short and long-term behavioral effects of prenatal cannabis exposure have been determined, yet the consequences on brain morphology were not known. Dr. El Marroun believes that a better understanding of what takes place in the brain could provide insights into how the children develop following exposure to cannabis.

Based on the published study, the researchers used a structural magnetic resonance imaging to analyze the brains of 54 children with ages six to eight, who were exposed to cannabis during the prenatal stage of development. The majority of the children exposed to cannabis was exposed to tobacco as well, and the researchers made a comparison between this group and the 96 children prenatally exposed to tobacco only and to 113 control group of children without exposure, according to Cannabis Culture.

The findings revealed the differences in the children's cortical thickness between those who were exposed to tobacco and the group that was exposed to both cannabis and tobacco. This suggests that exposure to cannabis has different consequences than the tobacco. Meantime, no differences were observed in the general brain volume of children exposed to cannabis.

While the latest findings, along with the current literature, support the importance of preventing exposure to cigarettes and cannabis during pregnancy, the researchers noted the need for a further research that will determine the causal nature of the connection between structural brain abnormalities and prenatal cannabis exposure,  Live Science reported.