Hospital emergency room diagnoses of recurring nausea and uncontrollable vomiting linked to frequent cannabis use leapt 16% from October 2025 to May of this year, according to a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report, driven partly by a new official diagnosis code for the condition.
A New Official Code and Surging Emergency Room Visits
The condition driving these emergency room visits is cannabis hyperemesis syndrome, a medical issue that has now been afforded its own International Classification of Diseases code under ICD-10-CM code R11.16, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Informally known as scromiting—a portmanteau of screaming and vomiting—the syndrome produces sudden and painful bouts of severe nausea, cyclical vomiting, and intense abdominal pain within 24 hours of a patient’s last cannabis use.
Even before this official reporting mechanism took effect, emergency room cases of the condition had already doubled between 2017 and 2021 according to prior research, and the ailment now impacts an estimated 2.75 million people annually in the United States. The CDC report attributes the abrupt, sustained increase observed between October 2025 and May of this year in part to the adoption of the new diagnostic code.
Shifting Demographics Among Young Cannabis Users
Medical literature published in journals like Gastroenterology previously indicated that cannabis hyperemesis syndrome primarily affected young males between the ages of 16 and 34. However, the new CDC analysis reveals a different demographic reality, showing the sharpest spike among patients aged 15 to 24, teenage girls, young women, Black Americans, and Native Americans.
Alana Vivolo-Kantor, an associate director for science in the CDC’s Division of Overdose Prevention and the new study’s first author, told the Associated Press that the overall increase among young people was unexpected, noting that there had been assumptions regarding how young people could have chronic use and how early they were using cannabis.
Alana Vivolo-Kantor of the CDC Division of Overdose Prevention noted that there had been assumptions regarding how young people could have chronic use and how early they were using cannabis.
Higher Potency Strains and Evolving Risks
Data from the U.S. National Institutes of Health indicates that the average psychoactive content in marijuana has nearly quadrupled, climbing from roughly 4% to about 16% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) since the 1990s. Vivolo-Kantor and her coauthors suggest that newer, higher-potency strains, concentrated THC products, vaping, and dabbing
—inhaling highly concentrated THC oils evaporated under high heat—are driving the earlier onset of symptoms, which can now emerge within the first year of cannabis use.
Complications from severe cannabis hyperemesis syndrome can escalate quickly. A 2024 literature review published in Gastroenterology warned that patients risk acute kidney injury, electrolyte imbalances, and in rare cases, a collapsed lung or death. To address these growing risks, the CDC report suggests that new educational materials and communications campaigns may be necessary to raise awareness among young people, as easier electronic mechanisms and stronger concentrations make it simpler for users to consume high amounts of THC.
