Maggie, what are the unpleasant side effects? Are the side effects also seen with patients not taking a synthestic version, like those eating brownies or otherwise using the natural version?
I’ve met someone who takes Marinol and I can say that when they are taking it they are twitchy, speedy, nervous, can’t sleep, and in general very unpleasant to be around. When they are not on it, they act normally. Compare that to the stoners I know who are relaxed, sleep well, and are generally fun to be around.
The synthetic version seems horrible. The natural product seems to be a safer bet. It’s much cheaper too until you add the cost of jail time, possibility of being shot by the police, and the total destruction of your life by the criminal justice system. But hey! We have to keep the evil plant off the streets, right? Think of the children!
Just don’t think about the children on chemo, have MS, or suffer from any other disease the plant helps with. It might mess with your dogma.
alternative medicine? i thought anything that has been proven to works is called… Medicine.
Yeah, I was thinking that the synthetic version would manifest with more side effects, at least in that dosage would be standard and perhaps the strength and amount in therapeutic value might vary in each person. Plus, who knows what other additives might be included in the manufactured version?
I have a pal who is a neurologist who treats MS and epilepsy patients. He said that one big reason that he does not recommend cannabis-based treatments for MS and epilepsy — despite the fact that they can actually suppress the problematic symptoms — is that 1) “Regular” medicine is usually equally effective and 2) “Regular” medicine does not result in the patient being stoned all the time
In this way, cannabis-based treatments are different than almost all so-called alternative medicines — cannabis is effective. But being stoned all the time is an undesirable side effect, so he’d rather use other drugs.
That being the case, he’s pro-cannabis for recreational use.
::sigh:: doctors and dosing… I have a pal who’s been a relapsing/remitting MS patient for 25+ years; his main med is Baclofen. He can walk 15 feet unaided (but shakily); for up to 50 feet a cane works; beyond that he needs a wheelchair. Like your neuro pal, he doesn’t want to be stoned all the time. But unlike your neuro pal, he doesn’t think of weed as a regimen. Instead, he treats it as a short-term palliative – if he’d like to be able to walk more-or-less normally for a couple hours, he has a couple of hits.
His two docs are kinda scandalized by this; to them a “med” is a full-time thing. Why is it so hard to understand that sometimes a guy just wants to walk?
I am deeply sorry that ANYONE has MS – what a shitty disease – and am delighted that weed helps him.
I can’t comment intelligently, since I am not a doctor, only a friend of one. (No, really.) I myself know nothing about MS drugs. So I have no idea what to say to “scandalized” doctors. I’d just be guessing.
Hopefully, someday the US will decide that Marijuana is no longer the most evil chemical on the planet, and researchers can write papers about how it doesn’t screw up MS treatments (I am making a wild guess!) and your friend’s docs can be less traumatized.
citation needed
I will assume that you are practicing humor.
If not: for one thing, it’s illegal to drive while stoned. Not-being-legally-able-to-drive is undesirable. Therefore being stoned all the time is an undesirable side effect.
I don’t know about the drugs used to treat MS, but when I get a bad enough migraine, I need to take enough codeine to make driving a really bad idea.
I will assume that you are practicing humor.
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