Weed can help your migraines, says new study — if you use it the right way

High hopes for headache relief.

A landmark new study suggests that inhaling a precise blend of CBD and THC can provide fast, meaningful relief from migraines.

The research — presented at the American Headache Society (AHS) Annual Meeting 2025 — is the first of its kind.

“This is the first placebo-controlled study in this space,” Dr. Nathaniel M. Schuster, a pain and headache neurologist and associate professor of anesthesiology at the UC San Diego (UCSD) Health Center for Pain Medicine, told Medscape Medical News.

“It’s the first real — to me — compelling evidence for the antimigraine effects of cannabis in humans.”

Scientists provided 92 patients — mostly women, with an average age of 41 — a treatment of 6% THC, 11% CBD, a combination of 6% THC and 11% CBD or a placebo.

Roughly 67.2% in the THC/CBD group reported pain relief at 2 hours, compared to 46.6% in the placebo group.

And approximately 34.5% of patients in the THC/CBD group achieved “pain freedom” within that timeframe, compared to 15.5% in the placebo group.

Patients also reported sustained pain relief up to 24 hours and most bothersome symptom freedom lasted through 48 hours.

Best of all: there were no serious side effects, although people in the THC-only group definitely got a little more high.

“It’s known that CBD is a noncompetitive, negative allosteric modulator of the CB-1 [cannabinoid receptor 1] receptor that decreases the psychoactive side effects of the THC,” Schuster said.

It’s a big win for weed but, before you get rolling, Schuster noted that the patients received very controlled doses.

“A lot of neurologists, myself included, suspect that there could be medication overuse headache with [using] cannabinoids frequently,” he said.

“When I counsel patients now, I say, ‘Look, we were only studying infrequent — four times over the course of a year — administration.’”

He encouraged patients to limit the treatment to under 10 times per month and to “optimally be using it really for those migraines that would not respond to standard-of-care therapy.”

Weed has skyrocketed in popularity since 38 states and DC have legalized it for medical use. Of those, 24 states and DC have also cleared the way for adults 21 and over to use it recreationally.

Research suggests that marijuana has the potential to ease chronic pain and reduce muscle spasms and stiffness linked to MS.

Cannabis products have also been shown to boost appetite in HIV/AIDS and cancer patients, and combat chemo-related nausea.

Other potential benefits include easing stress, alleviating PTSD symptoms and aiding sleep in some people.

However, mounting evidence does suggest it can pose risks to your heart, with one recent study showing marijuana has as much of a negative impact on cardiovascular health as tobacco — even if you don’t smoke.

Another recent study suggests that cannabis use raises the risk of heart attack and stroke more than cocaine, while other research claims it’s sending older people to the hospital.

Shockingly, scientists have also found that people with cannabis use disorder — that is, using weed enough that it causes problems and impairs your life — have altered dopamine activity in the brain that closely resembles patterns observed in psychosis.

“The biggest problem is that ever since it was made a Schedule 1 narcotic [in 1970], it has made it very difficult to do really well-devised, double-blind, placebo-controlled studies,” Dr. Ken Weinberg, chief medical officer of Cannabis Doctors of New York, previously told The Post.

“I don’t think there’s enough data.”