If you’re like most physicians, you are likely ignoring most of the hubbub about cannabis that is in the news these days.  Your patients certainly aren’t.   

With 10+ years counseling patients on the use of medical cannabis, here are 5 tips I wish I had known earlier in my career.

Our patients are likely struggling with cannabis more than you realize. While medical and recreational legalization have been moving quickly and seem like “it’s all fun and games”, the reality is that our patients, whether using medically or recreationally, need our intervention and guidance more than ever.

When considering medical cannabis, patients often have numerous questions for their physicians. These questions typically revolve around safety, efficacy, legal issues, and personal concerns. Here are some of the most common questions patients are likely to ask their physicians about medical cannabis:

With the incidence of colitis on the rise, is cannabis the cure we’ve been waiting for?

The Association of Cannabinoid Specialists (ACS) is an international non-profit organization of physicians and other health professionals specializing in using cannabis or cannabinoids, as appropriate, for the care and treatment of patients suffering from a range of debilitating conditions such as cancer, Crohn’s disease, AIDS, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy, autism, and post-traumatic stress disorder, and patients with terminal illnesses.

Dear Madam/Sir: I write to you to support the petitions before you to include anxiety, depression, and insomnia as qualifying conditions for medical cannabis treatment in Hawai’i.

In an editorial in JAMA, Dr. Nathaniel Morris, a recent Stanford graduate, laments that even in California where medical cannabis has been available since 1996, no medical education on cannabis was provided to him during medical school or residency.

Dear Attorney General Garland:

Subsequent to the letter sent to you, and to Secretary Becerra, by Senators Warren and Booker dated October 6, 2021 requesting that you exercise your authority under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970 (CSA), we write to support their request and to support your pragmatic efforts to do so.

Dear Majority Leader Schumer, Senators Booker and Wyden:

The below signed stakeholders are collectively parties that have an interest in or work with medical cannabis. We are committed to ensuring qualified physicians administer sound medical cannabis advice, that patients have access to high-quality, safe cannabis medicines, and that appropriate regulatory oversight is implemented to protect the integrity and value of cannabis medicine.