Pre 1937 Cannabis Therapeutic Uses
1. Analgesic-Hypnotic
2. Appetite stimulant
3. Anti-epileptic-antispasmodic
4. Prophylactic and treatment of the neuralgias, including migraine
and tic doloreux
5. Antitussive
6. Antidepressant-tranquilizer
7. Anti-asthmatic
8. Oxytocic
9. Topical anesthetic
10. Withdrawal agent and substitute for opiate, chloral, and alcohol dependence
11. Childbirth analgesic
source: http://www.mikuriya.com/cw_meduses.html
Pot docs help patients throughout California
After nearly four decades in medicine, Dr. David Bearman seems the
incarnation of a trusted old-school physician. His resume is long, his
record unblemished. It's his choice of treatment that makes him
conspicuous.
For most patients, Bearman recommends the same remedy: marijuana.
There is the young lady with epileptic seizures, the middle-age man
with multiple sclerosis, the amputee bedeviled by phantom limb pain.
Bearman's practice, based on a controversial curative not found on
pharmacy shelves, has proved lonely and professionally perilous.
Although the courts have upheld a doctor's right to recommend cannabis
for the seriously ill, few dare do so. Among the exceptions is a
tight-knit cadre of about 15 California doctors. Dubbed "pot docs,"
even by friends, they blithely claim credit for nearly half the
estimated 100,000 marijuana recommendations issued in the eight years
since California approved medical use of the drug.
There is Bearman in Santa Barbara and Dr. Frank Lucido, a family
doctor in Berkeley. Dr. Tod Mikuriya, a peripatetic medical marijuana
pioneer in the San Francisco Bay Area, has written approvals for 8,000
patients. A presidential drug czar once lambasted his brand of
medicine as a "Cheech and Chong show."
The criticism has been accompanied by intense scrutiny. At least 11 of
the cannabis doctors have weathered investigations by the Medical
Board of California. Half the cases closed without formal accusations.
But a few drew blood.
Medical Board officials say the problem is not the marijuana, but the
way the doctors practice medicine. Are patients thoroughly examined?
Do the doctors discuss other options?
Joan Jerzak, the Medical Board's chief investigator, said some doctors
eager to legalize recreational use "don't mind flouting the law."
To the pot docs, the attacks are about old grudges that will not die.
They say they've been singled out by a law-enforcement establishment
displeased by passage of California Proposition 215, the 1996 ballot
measure that legalized marijuana for the seriously ill in the state.
"Their attitude is, 'This isn't medicine, but rather a way to abet
drug abusers,' " said Dr. Philip Denney, who practices as if every
patient were a federal narcotics agent. "They have scared the hell out
of California doctors, and it's been left to us so-called mavericks."
The cannabis doctors say they practice serious medicine, focusing on
the sick and weeding out habitual pot smokers looking for protection
from arrest. Marijuana remains a remarkably safe substance, the pot
docs say, with tremendous therapeutic potential for AIDS wasting,
chemotherapy nausea and other grave conditions.
Aside from the pot docs, oncologists and HIV doctors write the bulk of
the cannabis recommendations.
Bearman, a 63-year-old family practitioner, figures it may be years
before marijuana is accepted by the medical establishment -- and by
the criminal-justice system.
"There's no doubt," he said, "this is part of a larger cultural war at play."
Jessica Griffith, a 27-year-old divorced mother of one, waddles into
Bearman's office, a metal cane in hand.
She carries a 3-inch stack of medical records detailing her four-year
fight against pain. She ruptured two discs in her back trying to lift
a box in, of all places, a health-food store. Griffith tells the
doctor she will soon have surgery to fuse her spine.
Meeting such a patient, someone bearing up under a painful or
debilitating condition that could be helped by marijuana, Bearman has
a standard response.
"You," he tells them, "are exactly the kind of patient the voters were
thinking of when they approved Proposition 215."
Like other cannabis doctors, Bearman does not dispense marijuana. How
patients obtain pot is up to them, but he sometimes points them to Web
sites listing cooperatives that distribute the drug.
Mikuriya churns out medical marijuana recommendations like a factory,
more than a dozen on a busy day. And he willingly acknowledges, unlike
most of his peers in cannabis consulting, that he does indeed smoke
pot, mostly in the morning with his coffee.
He looks a good decade younger than his 71 years and dresses nattily.
The only giveaway of his specialty: an embroidered logo on his white
lab coat showing the snake and staff of Aesculapius, the Greek god of
medicine, atop a marijuana leaf. Mikuriya, a psychiatrist, has studied
the drug's therapeutic potential since the 1960s, when he directed
marijuana research at the National Institute of Mental Health. He has
written books on its medical use. Mikuriya's list of more than 100
ills eased by cannabis includes insomnia, premenstrual cramps and
stuttering.
Marijuana is so effective and benign, Mikuriya said, that the bar for
patient approvals should be far lower than for prescription drugs.
Likewise, the role of cannabis consultants is not to perform
exhaustive diagnostic tests, he said, but to determine whether a
patient's condition is chronic and could be helped by pot.
Ultimately, the struggle over the pot docs comes down to one
fundamental question: Are they good gatekeepers for an inarguably
controversial medication?
If they don't dig deep to diagnose a patient's ills, "there isn't good
medicine going on," the Medical Board's Jerzak said. "It's just sales
of a particular prescription. It's Dr. Feelgood."
After wrangling with the CMA, the Medical Board in May spelled out a
softened approach. If doctors follow "accepted medical standards, they
can avoid being investigated."
If the board has an agitator, it is Lucido. The state investigated him
a few years ago, but dropped the case. Ever since, Lucido has
religiously attended board meetings, urging regulators to lay off pot
practitioners. "If patients aren't being harmed," Lucido said, "what
is the problem?"
Sources: Medical Board of California, Society of Cannabis Clinicians,
U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Los Angeles Times staff reports.
Provided by: Canadian Press
Written by: DENNIS BUECKERT
Feb. 2, 2006
Source: http://chealth.canoe.ca
OTTAWA (CP) - Medical marijuana advocates are angry over the
treatment of a Regina AIDS patient who was arrested after his pot
licence expired.
Tom Shapiro was handcuffed, along with his wife and son, for four
hours while police tried to determine his status in Health Canada's
medical marijuana program, said an official with the Canadian AIDS
Society.
"I'm very, very angry and upset at what happened," said Lynne
Belle-Isle of the society, who has been in frequent contact with
Shapiro since his house was raided Tuesday.
"There seems to be a broken link in the communications at Health Canada.
"We're talking about a very sick man who can barely walk. He's not
exactly a threat to police or the community and he's been trying so
hard to abide by the law."
Tom Shapiro was being held at the Regina police station Thursday while
officials tried to decide whether to charge him, his wife Roberta said
in an interview.
She said her husband's licence was delayed because Health Canada
lost his photographs.
"It was absolutely traumatic," she said, describing the raid carried
out by eight police officers, four wearing balaclavas.
After Health Canada confirmed that his licence had expired, the
police removed 16 plants from his basement, she said.
Her husband is unwell and has been throwing up more often since his
pot supply was confiscated, she said.
Tom Shapiro has been using medical marijuana since 2001, she said.
Health Canada faxed his new licence Thursday.
Health Canada spokesman Chris Williams said he could not comment on
individual cases, although he was aware of the Shapiro case.
He said it normally takes six weeks to get a licence but people are
encouraged to file the application in plenty of time.
"As soon as a licence has expired, it's no longer valid," he said.
"Ultimately, the issue rests with the police."
Elizabeth Popowich, spokeswoman for the Regina police, confirmed the
raid and said it would not be unusual for police to wear balaclavas or
use handcuffs.
"Executing a drug search is considered a high-risk warrant," she
said. "I don't think it would be outside of normal procedure."
She said investigators were interviewing Shapiro and had not decided
whether to charge him.
Alison Myrden, a Burlington, Ont., woman who uses marijuana to treat
pain associated with multiple sclerosis, said many patients have
trouble with the Health Canada process.
"They put us through so many hoops it's a circus."
Suspensions and jails as punishment for possession, trafficking
he Italian government has approved a law that increases sanctions against people who smoke marijuana, putting the drug on a par with cocaine and heroin.
Italy approves new marijuana law
By Christian Fraser
Under the new legislation, people found in possession of cannabis could risk having their passport and their driving licence suspended.
The government has forced through this new legislation with a confidence vote.
The move has been greeted mostly with dismay by opposition MPs and drug treatment professionals.
Under the new rules, dealing and trafficking in drugs - whether heroin, cocaine or cannabis - will be punished with jail sentences of between six and 20 years and a fine of up to 260,000 euros (£180,000).
People who ignore repeated warnings to stop using cannabis will face a driving ban and be forced to stay at home at night.
According to recent statistics, a third of teenagers in Italy have smoked marijuana at least once, and 10% of adults are said to smoke it on a regular basis.
On Wednesday more than 200 protesters and at least one opposition MP smoked cannabis joints in protest outside parliament.
Opposition leaders said it would be one of the first laws they abolish if they win power in April.
Dear Editor: As the son of a pharmacist from Rice Lake, a 1963 graduate of the University of Wisconsin who started his medical career in the Medical School in Madison, and someone with almost 40 years' experience in the field of drug abuse treatment and prevention and the last five years evaluating patients for medicinal cannabis, I want to compliment Rep. Gregg Underheim and the Wisconsin Assembly Health Committee for their recognition of the contemporary medicinal value of cannabis.
The committee is approaching this seriously and getting valuable input. It recognizes the 5,000 years of experience of medicinal use of cannabis. It is aware that just over the border in Canada, tincture of cannabis (Sativex) is being marketed by Bayer AG and in England the Home Office has given physicians the OK to prescribe tincture of cannabis.
I have taught courses on drugs at California universities and am very familiar with the history of medicinal cannabis use in the United States from 1839 to the present, and aware of the American Medical Association's testimony at the 1937 marijuana tax hearings that "the AMA knows of no danger in the use of cannabis and takes histories from countless patients with severe medical illness who benefited from their medicinal use of cannabis."
Consequently, I am baffled by the opposition of the Wisconsin Medical Society. This does not represent the compassion shown by the doctors in Rice Lake and Rochester who provided my father's care, nor does it reflect the quality of basic science I was taught by the UW School of Medicine in Madison.
I have seen patients who come in in wheelchairs, with canes, stooped in pain, who tell of the relief they receive from cannabis. These are people from all walks of life rich and poor, mostly over 40. Several have broken down in tears after receiving their approval making it legal to grow and possess cannabis. They say they are not lawbreakers or criminals and now can use this to medicate without fear of breaking the law.
We have far too many problems in the country to waste government resources arresting the ill and dying for using a medicine that provides relief and is legal in Canada, less than 100 miles from the Wisconsin border.
Dr. David Bearman
Goleta, Calif.
Since the first cannabis-based drug was approved for use in Canada last year, doctors say the medication is catching on among people with multiple sclerosis and could be used for other types of pain.
Sativex is a mouth spray that delivers medicinal marijuana. The metered spray is administered under the tongue or inside the cheek. It's concentrated to offer maximum pain relief with minimal marijuana buzz.
Health Canada was the first drug regulator to approve the medication for people with multiple sclerosis who can't get relief from traditional drugs.The spray treats neuropathic pain in MS – nerve pain that can be triggered by touch, temperature or movement and is often difficult to treat.
"It feels like its sort of boring through your bones," said Janet Liston of Ottawa. "It's like it's inside your bone."
Liston has been taking Sativex for six months, which is how long it has been available in Canada.
So far, a few hundred people worldwide have used Sativex in clinical trials. They report side-effects that include some respiratory infections. A feeling of mild intoxication or dizziness was the most common.
"The side-effects are a lot less than smoking marijuana," said Dr. Jock Murray, an MS specialist in Ottawa. "A lot of people surprisingly don't want to get high, they want to get relief from their pain."
Sativex will be tested in the U.S. for people with cancer. In Britain, it's being tried in the treatment of diabetic neuropathy.
Dr. Mark Ware is prescribing medicinal marijuana for a variety of conditions at his pain clinic in Montreal. The results so far are mixed but encouraging, he said."I think the potential for drugs like Sativex and the family of cannabinoid products which are inevitably to follow is incredibly wide."
One of the drawbacks of Sativex is that it costs about $500 a month. Provincial drugs plans don't cover it but some private insurance plans do.
**********************************
Editor note from The Herbal Curing Mom
$500.00 a month! do you know how much medical marijuana and tintcure you could make for $500.00!!!
When the governments and medical system's majority finally wake up and realize that this is a beneficial herb for treatment of so many ailments, the drug companies will make it as expensive and as hard to get as they do for everything else. the rich get richer,and the sick stay sick.
It won't stop personal crops from being grown! In fact may increase them, as well as underground illegal sales. People on disability pensions and low incomes due to their inability to work for a living are the main category of people in need of medical marijuana. Not having coverage, or being able to afford private medical insurance coverage means deciding between affording to feed the family, or treating their ailment with the most effective medicine still only available illegally.
Wake up world and decriminalize Marijuana!! We can have beer making and wine making stores, but we can't grow a plant and utilize it's benefits.
IF we all could grow our own without fear of prosecution, even the underground , over priced pot growers would be out of business.
Make laws for driving while under the influence and for public "drunkenness", and be done with it!
************************************
Now unable to work because of chronic pain and spasms, she was back in front of her old boss and San Bernardino County supervisors on Tuesday pleading with them to drop their plans to file a lawsuit challenging California's medical-marijuana law.
"My (other) choice is to take vicodin, go to bed, get up, take vicodin, go to bed," she told the Board of Supervisors.
About a dozen supporters of Proposition 215, California's medical-marijuana law approved in 1996, asked the board not to join San Diego County's suit against it.
After the meeting, they demonstrated in front of the County Government Center in downtown San Bernardino with signs and banners reading "Cannabis is medicine" and "Stop arresting medical marijuana patients."
Talbott worked at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center, the county hospital in Colton that was run for several years by Mark Uffer, who is now the county administrative officer, the top appointed official in county government.
With heavy doses of vicodin, a popular and powerful narcotic painkiller, she was unable to function, she said. Marijuana is the only medication that works for
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"The medication is so effective. I use it for severe pain" and to reduce neck spasms, she said. "I really didn't want it to work."
Also testifying were two of her children, who credited marijuana with giving them their mother back.
"Since she started medical marijuana, she has been able to get out of bed and spend time with her family," her 12-year-old daughter, Alexandra Talbott, told the board.
Sara Henuber, a registered physician's assistant from Los Angeles who worked for a time in San Bernardino County, told the board cannabis is a "safe and benign" medicine that does have benefits.
She said she's known of patients who have been
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"I believe San Bernardino County is going against the will of county voters," she said.
The county's lawsuit, scheduled to be filed today in San Diego, will argue that federal law pre-empts state law, said Deputy County Counsel Alan Green.
"It's creating a lot of confusion for sheriff's deputies," he said.
Sheriff Gary Penrod asked the board to file the suit to clarify what rules his deputies must enforce.
Lawsuits have been brought against the county to return marijuana confiscated from patients, he said.
"Under federal law, if we give it back, we're aiding and abetting marijuana use," Green said.
A U.S. Supreme Court decision last year said patients who use or cultivate marijuana are not immune to prosecution under federal law banning controlled substances.
Tuesday's demonstration and testimony was organized by Americans for Safe Access, a group that works on behalf of medical-marijuana patients.
Robert Brunelle, 24, told the board his wife uses marijuana and that he's known many people with cancer or HIV who have used it effectively.
"I can't help but think that what you're doing is wrong," he said.
After the meeting, his wife, Cindy Brunelle, 22, said she has chronic shoulder pain and depression.
"I've tried every depression medication in the world," she said, adding, "Marijuana is the only thing I still function on."
OTTAWA (CP) - Like any dope dealer, Health Canada has its share of marijuana customers who just don't pay their bills.
But unlike street pushers, the department avoids tire irons and switchblades to recover its bad debts in favour of stern letters and collection agencies.
As of last month, 127 people authorized to buy government-certified marijuana for various medical problems were officially in arrears, with bills unpaid for more than 90 days.
That's almost half the 278 patients who currently receive Health Canada marijuana or seeds, most of them buying 30-gram bags of ground buds for $150. A package of 30 seeds goes for $20.
Altogether, patients in arrears now owe $168,879 to Health Canada for medical marijuana, produced on contract by Prairie Plant Systems Inc. for the federal government.
The arrears amount has swollen by more than $100,000 over the last year alone, as department officials realized that their medical marijuana policy never indicated to patients the consequences of not paying their drug bills.
Spokesman Chris Williams says these patients now receive reminder letters and telephone calls from civil servants in the department's corporate services branch, and are given an opportunity to set up a repayment schedule.
"If all that is rejected, the supply would be halted," he said in an interview. So far, 19 users have been cut off from further shipments because of non-payment.
After 180 days, a final letter is sent and if no money arrives within 10 days, the matter is turned over to a collection agency, as would any other individual's stale account with Ottawa.
One medical marijuana user and activist slammed the Health Department for requiring often-impoverished patients to buy the product, saying taxpayers have already footed the bill once.
"The Canadian people have already paid for it - I think it's absolutely horrible that we're charging them twice," said Alison Myrden of Burlington, Ont., who has lived with multiple sclerosis for more than a decade.
"We have no money as it is. Most of us are on full disability for life . . . It's a choice between marijuana or food for most of us."
The first shipments of government marijuana in the fall of 2003 were of such poor quality, many medical users gagged, coughed and promptly returned the product. The batch was weak, dry, ground up too fine and included the less potent leaves and stems.
In May 2004, a new batch was released, eliminating the stem and leaves. Made of flowering tops only, the new dope had a higher moisture content and stronger levels of THC, the main active ingredient, though the buds were still ground up to ensure consistency.
Some users complained but others appeared to be content about the improved quality, though Myrden says the new batch still falls short of what's available on the street. She does not buy government dope.
Prairie Plant Systems, which grows the weed in a Flin Flon, Man., mineshaft, recently got a six-month extension of its $5.75-million contract with Health Canada, to June 30. The extension is worth another $670,000.
The federal government plans to put out the next contract to tender later this year, though it's unclear how the entire medical marijuana program will fare under the new Tory government to be sworn in Monday.
Former Tory health critic Stephen Fletcher, who has raised tough questions about the program in the Commons, declined to comment when asked about the new government's policy.
"I can't speak for the party any more on these issues until the leader picks the new health minister," he said in an interview.
Health Canada is also trying to set up a pilot project that would allow registered users to buy government marijuana at pharmacies without a prescription.
The already-delayed project, which was to have begun early this year, has been delayed again until at least the summer.
"A lot of these policies were put on hold until the election is over," Williams said.
The Herbal Curing Moms Green Tincture
You will need:
Glass jar- mason jar is ideal with lid ( not plastic)
Vodka.
To make Tincture:
Fill jar ¾ full of herb
Fill vodka until covering all the herb
Shake jar one or two times a day for 2 weeks.
Strain through metal tea strainer or paper coffee filter ( not plastic)
chop finely or grind the herb thoroughly in a blender. to get al the residue off hte blender, add some of the vodka and swish it around and add the vodka to your tincture jar. Herb should be fine or ground but doesn't have to be a powder. You can use leaf or bud. this is a great way to ustalize the medicianal properties in the leaf that is too minimal to smoke. Leaf works fine but for higher potency use the bud.
Use the highest proof alcohol you can. Everclear is 180 proof, but hard to find. I use the highest proof Vodka my local liquor store has. Pour alcohol over the herb, Put the lid on tightly. Don;t forget to label the contents and the date you started.
It takes two weeks for the alcohol to extract all the active elements from the herb. Shake the jar once or twice a day for 2 weeks. Keep in a dark place.
After 2 weeks of aging you can strain the tincture through a metal tea strainer or paper coffee filters into small tincture bottle bottles with a dropper. You can leave the rest in the jar if you want, and refill a single dropper bottle as needed. When left in the dark between fillings, it will age and mellow in flavor and you can strain off as much as you want at a time.
Alcohol is a strong preservative it will hold for a long time, this method of making herbal tinctures has been around for many generations.
The dosage will vary per individual, based on need, and body weight, so start small. three drops in a drink. Drink in cool water or a Hot tasty herbal tea like lemon, or green tea. Even warm milk is good when using tincture as a sleep aid It can be taken straight but may burn the tongue and has a very strong herbal taste.
The Herbal Curing Mom
Owner of Momsformarijuana.blogspot.com
Copyright 2006
Permission to copy is hereby granted, as long as credit is given and link is emailed to thisgoodifeel(at)gmail(dot)com
Source: http://www.thc-ministry.org/wwwboard/messages/174.html
Posted by Rev. Lorcan on March 15, 2004 at 18:39:44:
: Back in the mid-1990's I met Andy Hamid, a very bright human being and a wonderful guy. He was teaching at John Jay College in New York at the time and was a board member of NORML. He came to Hawai'i to testify in a marijuana trial of a friend of mine (pre-ministry). I hosted a dinner party for Andy and, among other stories, he shared his basic tincture recipe with us.
: Growing-up on the island of Trinidad where most people were very poor it was common for families to have a bottle of rum in the house. Rum comes from sugar cane. Andy told me that all families had a bottle of rum into which they would put a fresh-picked cannabis bud. Bud + rum = tincture, the all-purpose cannabis medicine.
: I tried it at harvest time. A fresh-picked Puna bud (about 1/4 oz.) put straight into a new bottle of 151 rum. 'Shaken, not stirred' and left to marinate for a few days. The clear rum turned golden-green in color...beautiful.
: Looking at the bottle with the cannabis bud on a stick inside pleased me more than just looking at a bud. It looks like a gourmet vinegar bottle with herbs inside, only BETTER! The bud goes a long way, too. This is a potent liquid. Usually a few drops will work the magic. Ok, a dropper-full can really do wonders.
: 151 rum is too hot for tincture to me, and it's not delicious. I tried Stoly vodka, tequila, Bailey's Irish cream whiskey and Amaretto - all with about a 1/4 to 1/2 ounce bud inside. They all make tincture, but Grand Marnier is the crowd-pleaser of them all.
: Here's how I do it now: take a one ounce eye-dropper bottle and put about one-half gram of cannabis bud inside. Add Grand Marnier almost to the top, leaving room for the dropper. Screw the top on tight and place the bottle in a pan of water. Bring almost to a boil and leave the bottle in the pan for about three minutes. Take a drop or two while warm and taste-test it yourself. If you can definitely taste the bud through the delicious orange-flavored Cognac then it's perfect. If you need more bud, add a little and heat it up again.
: Tincture is great. It can go in your pocket and pass through a metal detector. You can take a drop or two almost anywhere at any time. Zero smoke.
: Enjoy tincture of cannabis soon.
