The Neuroppsychopharmacology
research group at UPV/EHU

The Neuropsychopharmacology research group of the UPV/EHU organised a conference in Bilbao on 18 March on ‘Cannabis and schizophrenia’ within the International Brain Awareness Week. The conference, which was held jointly with the Spanish Cannabinoid Research Society, consisted of two general-interest scientific papers on the relationship between the drug and the disease.

Specifically, Leyre Urigüen, researcher of the Pharmacology Department at the UPV/EHU and the CIBERSAM, expounded on the “Scientific proof of the relationship between cannabis consumption and schizophrenia”, while Iñaki Markez, psychiatrist of the Osakidetza (Basque Public Health System), provided “A vision from clinical experience’ on cannabis and schizophrenia.

Luis F. Callado, Pharmacology Lecturer at the UPV/EHU, CIBERSAM researcher and Member of the Governing Board of the Spanish Cannabinoid Research Society and the Spanish Drug Addiction Society was the session's moderator.

The research papers of the UPV/EHU Neuropsychopharmacology group have obtained diverse awards, such as the 2008 Best Researcher Award in the field of Psychiatry, granted to Professor Javier Meana by the Spanish Society for Biological Psychiatry (SEPB). Meana received this award for his research on pharmacological treatment of schizophrenia and depression.

The general interest conference held on 18 March was framed within the International Brain Awareness Week, an initiative organised every March by the European Dana Alliance for the Brain (EDAB), with the collaboration of the different national neuroscience societies. This association gathers 180 eminent neuroscience experts from 27 different countries, including 5 Nobel Laureates.

The International Brain Awareness Week takes place in over 65 countries around the globe and tries to increase public awareness about scientific brain research by means of conferences, open forums, open days at laboratories and school visits by the researchers.