Stroke associated with marijuana abuse

We present the case of a 15-year-old with a cerebellar infarct that involved multiple arterial territories. It was temporally related to, and probably caused by, heavy marijuana use. While the mechanism of marijuana- associated stroke is unclear, the drug is known to cause hypotension and to impair peripheral vasomotor reflexes. We suspect that the child had diminished cerebral autoregulatory capacity and developed the stroke during a period of hypotension. Copyright (C) 2000 S. Karger AG, Basel.