Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jun 2000
Source: Santa Barbara News-Press (CA)
Copyright: 2000 Santa Barbara News-Press
Contact:  P.O. Box 1359, Santa Barbara, CA 93102
Website: http://www.newspress.com/
Author: Thomas Schultz,  News-press Staff Writer,  MEDICAL POT HAZY ISSUE FOR DOCTORS

Cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, arthritis, migraine headaches.

The list goes on.

When it comes to these and other ailments, some sufferers say marijuana 
provides welcome relief from pain, nausea, loss of appetite and other 
associated symptoms.

Whether such claims might ultimately lead to increased or widespread 
acceptance of the drug for medicinal purposes remains to be seen, however.

Public policy-makers and law enforcement officials continue to wade through 
the much-discussed and muddy legal waters generated by a recent spate of 
community and state initiatives to decriminalize marijuana for medical use 
in California and other states.

Health authorities face a similar challenge: Confirming the drug's actual 
medical benefits or drawbacks. It's a topic sure to garner more attention 
in Santa Barbara during coming weeks.

Last week, the City Council took a small step toward sanctioning the legal 
sale of marijuana for medical purposes, with a majority of councilmembers 
saying it was time to try to help patients buy the drug without fear of 
prosecution.

In the wake of that decision, a three-member council committee is 
considering whether to permit local marijuana clubs to operate without 
disruption in conjunction with the voter approved Proposition 215, the 1996 
California ballot initiative to legalize medicinal use of the substance.

Despite popular support for medicinal marijuana, discussion persists about 
the drug's reliability. Are its purported medical advantages understated or 
exaggerated?

Perspectives among health experts vary.

Some doctors hail the drug, while others support it mildly. Still other 
physicians disapprove of legalization.

Furthermore, a lack of extensive, recent and numerous studies on medical 
marijuana has frustrated both supporters and opponents.

Ask for a source of information on the science behind medicinal cannabis, 
and more often than not the most recent study recommended is an 
investigation conducted by researchers at the Institute of Medicine. The 
report was commissioned by the White House Office of National Drug Control 
Policy and released last year.

The project's authors found potential for marijuana in treating some 
patients who do not respond well to standard medications, but also warned 
that the drug's future as a long-term treatment should not involve 
inhalation of pot smoke, which is known to contain harmful carcinogens.

"We found that cannabinoids (psychoactive marijuana particles) appear to 
hold potential for treating pain, chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting 
and the poor appetite and wasting caused by AIDS or advanced cancer," 
announced report co-author John Benson last year at a news conference about 
the study.

"For other conditions, the data are not encouraging," Benson said. "We did 
not find compelling evidence that marijuana should be used to treat 
glaucoma. And with the exception of painful muscle spasticity associated 
with multiple sclerosis, there is little evidence of the drug's potential 
for treating migraines or movement disorders like Parkinson's disease or 
Huntington's disease .E.E. Most often, the appropriate studies have not 
been done."

Dr. Fred Kass, a Santa Barbara cancer expert, supports use of marijuana for 
those patients who find benefit. At the same time, he's never prescribed 
pot and only rarely writes prescriptions for the FDA-approved drug Marinol, 
a manufactured version of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the primary 
psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.

Marijuana doesn't come up all that often among his cancer patients who 
suffer from nausea or other symptoms that can result from cancer or its 
treatments, said Kass, who more often relies on standard pharmaceuticals.

"I think, for most doctors, it's not an integral part of their practice," 
Kass said. "No patient has come in to me and said, 'I need marijuana. you 
need to help me get it.'"

The oncologist said AIDS patients, however, stand to benefit more. "That's 
the group in which it's been a potentially much more important drug," he said.

City Council member Dr. Dan Secord voted against further consideration of 
the medical marijuana question, along with Councilmen Gregg Hart and Rusty 
Fairly.

As a doctor, Secord acknowledged that some patients may find cannabis helpful.

Appetite stimulation among severely ill patients may be appropriate in some 
cases, he said. For other uses, and overall, Secord is not convinced, however.

"I am concerned about the use of these drugs for marginal illnesses," such 
as migraines, Secord said.

He also expressed concern that support for medicinal marijuana will lead to 
increased drug abuse.

In addition, "there may be some science, but nobody seems to be sure what 
it is," Secord said.

Dr. David Bearman, a Santa Barbara general practitioner, noted that humans 
have relied on marijuana for centuries to treat illness.

"It provides mostly symptomatic relief," Bearman said. "There's no doubt 
that when you talk to people who use cannabis, they benefit substantially."

Bearman advises local resident David Pryor, who recently organized the 
nonprofit Compassionate Cannabis Center to distribute marijuana along the 
South Coast. On Tuesday, Pryor lamented a lack of extensive and recent 
U.S.-based research supporting medical marijuana applications, and said the 
nonprofit organization he leads will further supply area doctors with 
reliable information on medicinal benefits.

The doctors, "they're in the blind," said Pryor, who inhales vaporized, 
smokeless marijuana to ease the pain of high blood pressure, arthritis and 
other ailments.

Physicians, "they really have nothing to go on but their patients."

The cannabis center, which has lobbied the City Council, currently 
distributes marijuana to those who qualify, Pryor said.

To hand a bundle of the drug to a suffering AIDS patient, "you've saved 
their life, and made their life better," Pryor said. "I have never felt so 
good about something."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jo-D