In areas where they have legalized it for cancer patients etc, how is it used?
Does it have to be smoked?
Is there a delivery system for people with compromised lung capacity?
Would swallowing the drug (say in a capsule for example) have the same anti-nausea properties?
Have they attributed any benefits other than nausea reduction? (Like pain releif)
I hope this is within the realm of acceptable questions. I really need to know, and for legitimate reasons 
Thanks for any help guys.
I’ve heard that Marijuana helps people who suffer from Glaucoma, but I don’t remember how.
Kelli - there is a tableted form of THC which is the main active ingrediant in marijuana, however some people would argue that because it doesn’t contain all the natural active constituents of the whole herb, it is not as effective. As far as lungs being compromised, you could also eat it (marijuana brownies) if you didn’t want to smoke it. As far as I’m aware the anti-nausea effects would apply no matter how the drug is consumed, although I’m not 100% on that.
[quote]
In areas where they have legalized it for cancer patients etc, how is it used?
Does it have to be smoked?
Is there a delivery system for people with compromised lung capacity?
Would swallowing the drug (say in a capsule for example) have the same anti-nausea properties?
Have they attributed any benefits other than nausea reduction? (Like pain releif)
I hope this is within the realm of acceptable questions. I really need to know, and for legitimate reasons
[quote]
First of all, the Supreme Court is going to vote on whether or not law supercedes personal health regarding Medicinal Marijuana laws I believe. I believe they will rule the Medicinal Marijuana laws “unconstitutional” and strike them down, causing a major setback towards the legalization or decriminalization of it. Anyways…
Marijuana does not have to be smoked to feel the effects of it’s main ingredient, Delta-9 TetraHydraCannibanol(THC). In my experience, it can be taken in the form of a brownie or baked into other foods. 
These methods eliminate the carcinogenic effects on the lungs and respiratory system. They also work almost as well, although the full effects are not felt for some time (Exactly an hour and a half in my case, 5’11 and 145 pounds.) In California, if you have a legitimate reason for using Marijuana and you have a doctors reccommendation, you can get a card from the Gov’t that basically allows you to have/use Marijuana, as long as you use common sense and dont drive under the influence and such. You also cannot go around selling it to people just because you have the card, etc. Basically it is just common sense. There are other states who have recently voted to legalize it for medicinal purposes.
See above.
There is a drug on the market that is made up of synthetic THC, it is called Marinol. Unfortunately, many people who use it say that it does not work as well as the real thing.
Marijuana has other benefits besides an anti-nauseant. It is also used as an appetite stimulant, treatment for Glaucoma, pain relief for several diseases (arthritis is the only one that comes to mind at the moment).
Some links that you may find helpful
http://www.norml.org (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws)
I hope this helps you, and feel free to drop me a line if you have any other questions.
Peace
Just curious, but any clue on what basis they will rule it unconstitutional? I’m not fully up on constitutional law, so any help would be appreciated on that part.
Just curious, but any clue on what basis they will rule it unconstitutional? I’m not fully up on constitutional law, so any help would be appreciated on that part.
Damnit I can’t find the report that said that they would rule the law as unconstitutional. However I have found what the story is.
A Medicinal Marijuana club in Oakland has come under fire from the Government over it’s distribution and use of Marijuana. They went to court, were shut down, appealed and had the decision reversed. The matter was then brought to the attention of the Supreme Court. (Now the problem with the fact that Medicinal Marijuana is legalized in California is that it still illegal under Federal Law.) Anyways, the court will rule on whether law overrules medical necessity, as many people with a Med. Marijuana card are sick and dying.
Some links http://www.marijuananews.com
http://216.9.192.67/news.php3?sid=13
I don’t really know that much about it, either, but I think the Federal strategy would be simply to assert the primacy of Federal over state law. On the face of it, I can see that the popular state initiatives contradict Federal law, though I personally voted for it in my state. According to the strict letter of the law, the Feds unfortunately have a very strong case. On the other side of it, I can see a few reasons why this is a political minefield for the federal government. Most importantly, to strike the law down would tell the millions who voted them in that they were misguided. Second, federal drug law enforcers have historically focused their attention on large scale growers and dealers. Possession for personal use is a Federal crime, but I don’t believe it is really enforced very much by itself, i.e., not unless other more serious offenses are part of the picture.
But all this is just my WAG, so anyone please feel free to
set me straight.
As I was reading the news interview on the second link, I caught something that really stuck in my craw. One of the guys holding the discussion said
“Alcohol is not necessarily an intoxicant. It is when [abused, but marijuana is an intoxicant.”
I cannot stand people like this. Many adults I talk to about legalization say that citizens don’t have the right to use marijuana, and it’s illegal, and thats the final word. They don’t seem to understand that it is completely unconstitutional to tell an American citizen what he can and cannot ingest into his body without the government stepping in and arresting him. People get their doors kicked in and their house ransacked at 3 A.M. to find even a small amount of Marijuana, which is completely ludicrious. (And don’t tell me that it doesn’t happen either. I’ve seen it.)
I have had my room searched by cops and they found 1.5 grams of weed and a pipe and treated me like I was Charles Manson. One of the things they said before they left was “since we caught you with this now, we can go to a judge, get a warrant, and break down your door at anytime and search again.” That wasn’t even the worst part! During the interrogation one of the officers said to me “I am a Juvenile Officer, you know what that means? I can pick you up at anytime. I don’t need your parents to say anything. One day I could be waiting outside your classroom and arrest you in front of your entire class. If your parents call me and say ‘Junior was supposed to be home two hours ago, find him’ I will arrest you.”
All over 1.5 grams of Cannabis. Seems like a big waste of money and time to me. And to think I used to DEFEND cops when my friends would talk about how bad they are. Now I hate every one of them.
[end rant]
Yes, their strategy is to say that Federal Law takes precedence over State Law. However the underlying issue is that this will cause a great deal of pain and suffering to the people who have legitimate medical reasons for using it. Oh well, thats the way our government works.
It’s legal here in California now, and the newpapers have ads from doctors hyping it!
They say things like “Do you have any of these sysmptoms: Headaches, nausea, …” Things anyone can claim.
Then it ends with cartoons of a leaf and a smiley face!
If that’s not a clue to the real intentions, I don’t know what is.
[quote]
It’s legal here in California now, and the newpapers have ads from doctors hyping it!
They say things like “Do you have any of these sysmptoms: Headaches, nausea, …” Things anyone can claim.
Then it ends with cartoons of a leaf and a smiley face!
If that’s not a clue to the real intentions, I don’t know what is.
[quote]
2.It angers me to think that this law is being flouted by doctors who are most likely breaking the law by perscribing medication for those who do not need it. While I believe it should be legalized (and will be, eventually) the fact that the law is being exploited now is what bothers me.
3.Are these ads for actual doctors or do they seem like they are made up? I’ve never heard about these commercials. Interesting.
Peace
Thanks for the help guys.
My mother has terrible bone pain from chemo, and the painkillers make her nauseus and dizzy, so she toughs out the pain
Even if I can find cannibus in non-smoking form, I think she might refuse to take it.
She is pretty old fashioned. (like me! 
)
Thanks again.
kelli, this is just a guess on my part, but ingesting it may not be as effective as smoking it for nausea. If one is that sick, one may not actually be able to hold the food or pill down long enough for it to have any effect. Inhaling, on the other hand, is practically instantaneous- compare inhaling to ingesting cold or allergy medicines.
An aquantance fighting Hodgeson’s was prescribed Marinol, but the doctor recommended that he smoke. He did find that smoking was far more effective in fighting the side effects of chemo, also that Marinol was more mentally debilitating. He could smoke and function at work, but could not think clearly while on Marinol. Like your mother, older ladies that I have known who were fighting cancer have not been interested in marijuana, frightened away by the illegal aspects and the paranoia. Check out Marinol, anyway.
Kellibelli, there is a very good chance you aid her in pain relief. You would probably have to sit down with her and explain to her what Cannabis does and how it can be extremely beneficial. Tell her almost everything she has heard or seen of smokers in the media is wrong. If you live in a medicinal marijuana state (which state do you live in, by the way?) There are several states with Med. Marijuana laws that have or are passing through state gov’t. If she still resists, talk to her doctor with her.
You mentioned that even if you find cannabis in non-smoking form that she still may not take it. The thing is that if you buy marijuana in smokable form, you can bake it into food. There is no “non-smoking” form. It’s pretty much all the same. You also mentioned that your mother gets nausea from the painkillers, not from the pain itself. This would probably be the way to go. There are many sites on the internet where you could find recipies for baking marijuana into brownies or such.
I hope this helps, and good luck!
Medical marijuana’s (MMJ) advocates, it must be admitted, also have strong case in their own way. For 80 years, the supposed justification for drug prohibition, as a political fact, is that we have *voted * for it, in the sense that we continually re-elect avowed prohibitionists as our legislators, and that politicians who deviate from this “standard wisdom” risk their political careers. In this context drug prohibition may seem to result clearly from the will of the people. And yet, wherever MMJ has been legalized, we, the very same “people”, have sent a profoundly different message. As I mentioned above, telling millions of voters that they were wrong or stupid is profoundly insulting, and it’s clear that what the exact “will of the people” is needs to be re-examined.
Are you in Canada?
AFAIK, medical marijuana is now legal in Canada, though you have to get a permit from the federal governemnt, or be in a clinical trial.
There has been a catch-22 situation that it was still illegal to trade or buy for it, so the medical users had to grow it themselves, but late last year the federal government let a contract to a company in Saskatchewan to grow the first legal supply, underground in a mine. Unfortunately that may not be available until '02.
"The awarding of the contract solves a conundrum for the government, which had seen courts in Ontario and Alberta strike down marijuana laws because they did not allow for medical use, but had not yet identified a legal supplier.
However, Health Canada officials gave no indication whether Ottawa will loosen its policy on medical marijuana, which now allows legal use only by patients in clinical studies and by about 140 people with medical exemptions."
The article goes on to mention the difficulties with distribution, and the desire to make it legal and obtainable for use with a doctor’s prescription.
“The first delivery to the government will not take place for a year, however, and Health Canada officials said they have not yet decided how they will distribute the drug to patients who use it under a doctor’s orders, or whether those patients will pay.”
So the situation has gone from next-to-impossible to merely very difficult. Unfortunately this does not seem to address the next year or so.
Globe and Mail reference:
I hate these %$^&&^ search URLs… It’s an article from the Globe and Mail, titled “Federal pot farm planned at mine”. It may be easier simply to go to their main page http://www.globeandmail.com/ and search for “medical marijuana”
(A FOAF has Crohn’s…)
kelli, sorry to hear that your mom is back on chemo.
as sunspace said, you may have some luck trying Health Canada, or having your mom’s doc try Health Canada. That may help allay her concerns about the legality issue. Don’t know how quickly they would respond.
kelli, just had another thought. In light of the federal government’s changing attitude to medicinal marijuana, it may be worthwhile contacting your mom’s MP to see if he/she can be of any assistance in getting Health Canada to help you.
Here’s a link to Members of the House of Commons that you may find helpful.
Good luck!!
I just did some digging on the federal government’s site, and found this:
“News Release: Update on Health Canada’s initiatives on marijuana for medical and research purposes”
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/english/archives/releases/1999/99_117e.htm
Public inquiries 1-613-957-2991.
Also, under Regulated Products" I found an Interim Guidance Document which appears to clarify the actual regulation to follow when applying:
It goes on to outline the information required (patient, doctor, proposed drug/controlled substance and proposed course of treatment) and the address for the information to be sent to.
Good luck…
Many of you may remember a highly-publicized study from a year or two ago. The U.S. government commissioned the IOM (I think… Too many acronyms floating around in my head) to determine whether or not pot has medicinal benefits. To nobody’s surprise the study concluded that yes, marijuana has medicinal benefits, and no, it is not a gateway drug. Government’s response? We need more research. Nevermind that people have been using this stuff for 6,000 years. Nevermind that friggin’ Queen Victoria used pot for medicinal purposes. Nevermind that cancer patients with a few months to live aren’t really that concerned about contracting lung cancer which takes twenty years to develop. F-'em all. We’re the government and we can do whatever the hell we want. At least that’s the message I’m taking away from the table. Eight or ten years from now, they’ll commission an identical study which will yield identical results and prompt them to again say that “more research needs to be done.”
A couple years ago, a person in a wheelchair approached Rep. Bob Barr and begged him to help make her medicine legal. He shrugged her off, calling her “a prop.” F’-em all. The more you listen, the louder this message seems to resound.
I don’t think it’s any small coincidence that the two groups who stand to lose the most money from legalization (alcohol industry, pot’s recreational competition, and the pharmaceutical industry, their medicinal competition [after all, you can’t patent a plant]), are the two biggest contributors to political campaigns in the country. It’s also kind of fishy that the Partnership for a Drug Free America, who demonizes pot, but barely mentions hard drugs, and NEVER mentions alcohol, receives 75% of its funding from - you guessed it! - the alcohol industry.
Don’t you think that it’s kind of funny that Marinol was quickly and painlessly approved? No uproar, no politicians screaming “WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN!,” no nothing. Why? Well, the pharmaceutical people were profitting off of it. In approving Marinol, the government essentially admitted pot has medical uses. Yet this semi-innocuous plant still bears the infamous Schedule 1 designation. It’s right there alongside heroin, crack, and methamphetamine (though the pharms milked that last one for all they could. Ever heard of Benzedrine, the number one prescription drug of the 50s and 60s? It was meth.)
But enough ranting. I have some …
Possibly helpful advice for those who don’t want to irritate their lungs with pot smoke, but can’t keep a brownie or a pill down.
Vaporization. This is where you heat marijuana to the point of THC vaporization, but not to the point of full combustion. The vapor has sort of a piney taste and is very smooth going down. I’m not sure if all the right chemicals would vaporize for it to be useful as medical marijuana, but it’s worth a try.
Basically there are two kinds of vaporizors. The cheap one is called a bubble. It’s about 30 bucks. It’s basically a pyrex ball connected to a stem. Hold a lighter under it at just the right spot and you’ll get it to vaporize. It may take some practice to keep it from combusting, though.
A more expensive option is an electric vaporizer that heats the pot to just the right temperature. These costs about $60-100. They don’t have any temperature gauge, so you just kind of have to trust them, I guess. In my experience, they work well.
I have also seen a vaporizer that you can actually adjust the temp on, but it was hideously expensive. About $400, I think.