Nowhere in the story do I see that marijuana was prescribed for this child. What I see is a mother who is a marijuana advocate, takes it herself, and decided against medical advice that her daughter should take it as well. That seriously bothers me.
It has nothing to do with the fact that the drug is marijuana. I would feel the same way if the doctors had prescribed marijuana, and the mother decided to give the child some conventional painkiller instead because she was opposed to pot.
It’s good that the mother is not completely into woo and is giving her child the appropriate chemotherapy treatment, but she still shouldn’t be deciding, based on her own advocacy of a particular medication, and the fact that she finds it helpful, that it is the best treatment for her 7-year-old daughter.
She’s getting it through a medical marijuana program. That does imply it’s prescribed, doesn’t it?
It might be a little self-involved, but she’s not required to accept the opinions of the first doctor she sees.
Yeah, it seems to be working here. And one of the unfortunate truths about medications is that sometimes, some drugs don’t work for a particular person and others do. Some people don’t get much help from anti-nausea meds and weed works.
You mean other than the fact that opiates are more effective as pain relievers than cannabis? Would it be better if she just smoked opium since it is “natural”?
No medical marijuana in my state. And the anti-nausea meds they gave me when I was on chemo were horrible. Terrible joint cramps and no help with nausea. So I talked to my doctor and told him I was planning on self medicating with pot. He told me that while he couldn’t recommend it he would be interested in the results if I chose to do so. It cut my rate of weight loss in half.
I, too, am concerned about the risk of triggering schizophrenia. But if the family history is clear of the disease, and the mother can clearly understand and articulate the risk, I’m not so concerned that I think she should be forcibly stopped from giving the child cannabis oil. The schizophrenia link to adolescent marijuana use is worrisome, but I don’t think it’s, at this point, a foregone conclusion. Studies have been done on smoked, not ingested, whole leaf, not oil, adolescents, not children - if we’re going to use the “it hasn’t been properly studied!” argument against the purported benefits, I think it’s only intellectually honest to maintain the same for the risks.
And there are good reasons to think this little girl may not survive to her 20’s to develop the schizophrenia anyhow, even were she to have the genetic marker for it. That gives the risks:benefit analysis a whole 'nother spin.
Face it, there are side effects to everything that has an effect. While I value doctors’ input and knowledge of medications and risks (as well as that of pharmacists), at the end of the day, there is only one person who has to look this little girl in the eye as she’s throwing up at 2am and explain why she can’t have the capsules that worked, and instead has to take this pill that doesn’t work. It’s not the doctor.