The Undeniable Entourage Effect and CBD

Whether you’re a new or experienced CBD user, it’s unlikely you’ve heard much about the entourage effect before. While it’s a fairly recent discovery, it only confirms what holistic medicine users have known for centuries. But what is the entourage effect?

The entourage effect is the principle of whole plant medicine being more effective than individual parts. It’s the process of a plant’s various components working together to produce a more powerful medicine than simply the strongest parts on their own.

We at pHAZE Naturals work closely with the entourage effect in our CBD products to ensure they’re the best they can be. In this article, we’ll talk a bit more about the entourage effect so you can understand how it helps in CBD products.

How does the entourage effect work?

To understand the entourage effect, we first need to go over some basic information. Cannabis plants, as you may know, contain THC and CBD. These are the most prominent active compounds, but the plants actually contain more than 120 phytocannabinoids.

These compounds interact with your endocannabinoid system, which is an important part of your central nervous system. This is the reason why cannabis compounds offer so much promise in medicine: they’re perfectly designed to bind with various receptors in your body.

THC and CBD are the most thoroughly researched compounds found in the cannabis plant. THC is the part that gets you high, while CBD is the part that reduces many of the negative side effects of this high (anxiety and paranoia, for example).

In the 1980s, a pure THC drug was manufactured called Marinol. Researchers believed this would provide all the positive benefits of the cannabis plant, but they were wrong.

Not only did patients get stoned (an unwanted side effect in medicine), but they didn’t experience any of the positive benefits that CBD provides.

On the other hand, a drug like Sativex balances THC and CBD to reduce the high, meaning more patients can use the medicine in their everyday lives. But for some, this was still too much of a high to function properly.

The reason this happens is again because of your endocannabinoid system. It has a series of receptors, known as CB1, which is what THC molecules bind with to create a high.

While CBD molecules aren’t the perfect shape for this receptor, they’re close enough. Therefore, they can bind with the CB1 receptors and so reduce the number that are open for the THC molecules.

This is perhaps the best example of the entourage effect. While THC is beneficial for some conditions, such as insomnia, many people find the side effects to be very limiting. By combining it with CBD, many of these side effects are reduced or removed completely.

What does the entourage effect mean for CBD products?

Obviously, the benefit of CBD products like the ones we produce at pHAZE are that they provide many of the positive benefits but without the stoned feeling. Many people prefer CBD products because it means they can still function while benefitting from everything CBD can offer.

But in order to be as effective as possible, CBD products need a range of other cannabis compounds. For example, our products still have plenty of the terpenes found in the plants, which have their own range of positive effects.

Similarly, our CBD products contain less than 0.03% THC. This is nowhere near enough to get you high but is enough to promote the entourage effect. Even such a small amount of THC provides the benefits of whole plant medicine without any of the potentially negative side effects.

CBD products are helpful in managing a number of conditions, most notably:

• Migraines
• Chronic pain
• Nausea
• Inflammation
• Seizures

CBD is a common form of treatment for children with epilepsy because it helps to manage the seizures much more effectively than synthetic pharmaceuticals. But obviously, this is a prime example of why whole plant medicine wouldn’t be the best idea. After all, not many people want their kids to be stoned all the time.

This is a common misconception with CBD products like the ones we sell at pHAZE. Many believe that they’ll get you high, but this is untrue. By removing the THC molecules to such a low percentage, our products are able to offer the relieving benefits of CBD but without the limiting high.

Including a range of terpenes and a tiny percentage of THC in our products means they’re able to encourage the entourage effect, which gives them the potential to be more effective than a pure CBD isolate.

What does the research say about the entourage effect?

Although CBD products have boomed in popularity, conclusive scientific research is still lacking because of restrictions placed on anything cannabis-related in many countries around the world. However, the research done so far shows plenty of promise for their benefits.

For example, in 2011, Ethan Russo conducted a study on the entourage effect and how it relates to CBD. He concluded that combining the various compounds found in the cannabis plant is much more effective than any of the compounds taken alone.

Russo conducted a further study in 2019 on the entourage effect and how it could be utilized in the production of medicinal cannabis. He again concluded that using a single isolated molecule from the plant would not be as effective as using a combination or whole-plant approach.

pHAZE products and the Entourage Effect

Here at pHAZE, we strongly believe in our CBD products. They’re manufactured to produce the entourage effect, meaning you get the full benefits of the whole plant without any of the limiting side effects.

We want as many people as possible to benefit from our products in whatever way they can. By promoting the entourage effect, we hope to show you how effective CBD products can be for a range of health issues. So if you think pHAZE’s CBD products would help you, give them a try today, and always “Roll with your Entourage”.

And if you have any thoughts on the entourage effect and what it could mean for the future of medicinal cannabis, let us know below.