Unlike hospice, long-term drug safety is an important issue in palliative medicine. Opioids may produce significant morbidity. Cannabis is a safer alternative with broad applicability for palliative ...care. Yet the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) classifies cannabis as Schedule I (dangerous, without medical uses). Dronabinol, a Schedule III prescription drug, is 100% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the most psychoactive ingredient in cannabis. Cannabis contains 20% THC or less but has other therapeutic cannabinoids, all working together to produce therapeutic effects. As palliative medicine grows, so does the need to reclassify cannabis. This article provides an evidence-based overview and comparison of cannabis and opioids. Using this foundation, an argument is made for reclassifying cannabis in the context of improving palliative care and reducing opioid-related morbidity.
Given the very limited toxicity of marijuana and the growing appreciation of its therapeutic value, it will undoubtedly find increasing application as a medicine in the coming years. But there is ...uncertainty about the forms in which it will be made available. Governments are hesitant to approve it because of concern about its use for nonmedical purposes and the difficulties of distributing as a medicine a substance that is already easily available. An alternative is the development of commercial cannabis pharmaceuticals that can be regulated and controlled. But pharmaceutical firms will be reluctant to invest the necessary money if they believe they cannot compete successfully with marijuana. Some of these products may have advantages over whole smoked or ingested marijuana, but most will not, and they will all be quite expensive. Ultimately, we can anticipate two medical distribution networks, a legal one for cannabinoid pharmaceuticals and an illegal one for street or homegrown marijuana.
The Harmfulness Tax Grinspoon, Lester
Social research,
09/2001, Letnik:
68, Številka:
3
Journal Article, Conference Proceeding
Recenzirano
The main obstacle to thinking about any serious alternative to present drug policies is that no one in government wants to give up the symbolism of the criminal law or the commitment that has been ...made over the last 80 years, not only in the US but all over the world, to treating drugs as a criminal problem. Grinspoon suggests a proposal for a noncriminal approach to recreational drugs.
Whither Medical Marijuana? Grinspoon, Lester
Contemporary drug problems,
03/2000, Letnik:
27, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Given the very limited toxicity of cannabis and its increasingly acknowledged therapeutic value, it will undoubtedly find increasing application as a medicine in the coming years. But there is ...uncertainty about the forms in which it will be made available. Governments are unlikely to approve it because of concern about its use for nonmedical purposes and the difficulties of distributing as a medicine a substance that is already easily available. An alternative is the development of commercial cannabis pharmaceuticals that can be regulated and controlled, but pharmaceutical firms will be reluctant to invest the necessary money if they believe they cannot compete successfully with marijuana. Although some of these products may have advantages over whole smoked or ingested marijuana, most will not, and they will all be quite expensive. Ultimately, we can anticipate two medical distribution networks: a legal one for cannabinoid pharmaceuticals and an illegal one for street or homegrown marijuana.
The authors present case histories indicating that a number of patients find cannabis (marihuana) useful in the treatment of their bipolar disorder. Some used it to treat mania, depression, or both. ...They stated that it was more effective than conventional drugs, or helped relieve the side effects of those drugs. One woman found that cannabis curbed her manic rages; she and her husband have worked to make it legally available as a medicine. Others described the use of cannabis as a supplement to lithium (allowing reduced consumption) or for relief of lithium's side effects. Another case illustrates the fact that medical cannabis users are in danger of arrest, especially when children are encouraged to inform on parents by some drug prevention programs. An analogy is drawn between the status of cannabis today and that of lithium in the early 1950s, when its effect on mania had been discovered but there were no controlled studies. In the case of cannabis, the law has made such studies almost impossible, and the only available evidence is anecdotal. The potential for cannabis as a treatment for bipolar disorder unfortunately can not be fully explored in the present social circumstances.
There is some evidence that the psychotherapeutic process can be enhanced by the use of drugs that invite self-disclosure and self-exploration. Such drugs, known as psychedelics, might help to ...fortify the therapeutic alliance and facilitate abreaction, catharsis, understanding, acceptance, and forgiveness.
