United States: If you are in chronic pain and think medical marijuana is the answer well then you may be in for a surprise.
Overall, in a new survey of people residing in states where medical cannabis is legal 71% of the people with chronic pain supported the federal legalization of the drug, whereas only 59% of the physicians in the survey wanted it legalized.
The survey of 1,600 chronic pain patients and 1,000 physicians also revealed that 64% of patients felt insurers should cover medical marijuana while only 51% of the doctors agreed.
As reported by HealthDay, and when it came to marijuana for recreational use, the divide was even more pronounced: There is a split borne out in the polling data: 55 percent of chronic pain patients believed that marijuana should be legal across all 50 states, 38 percent of physicians concurred.
Still, the ‘’entire’’ picture painted shows that patients with chronic pain supported the policies that could ‘’facilitate’’ the use of medical cannabis more than the providers who supported the policies that could ‘’limit’’ the use of medical cannabis, according to the lead author of the study, Elizabeth Stone. She also teaches as an instructor in psychiatry at Rutgers University in Robert Wood Johnson Medical school in New Brunswick New Jersey.
Her team shared its findings recently in JAMA Network open magazine.
Availability of medical and recreation marijuana is today limited depending on different states in the United States. Currently, thirty-eight states and Washington, D.C. have legalized medical marijuana and twenty-three more of those states plus D.C. have legalized pot for recreational use.
“Cannabis is different when it comes to policy regimes,” Stone said in a news release about Rutgers. ”It may be that medical marijuana is legal in your state, it may be that both medical and recreational marijuana is legal in your state or it may be that neither is legal but certain things are legalised.”
Her team’s survey focused on the adult chronic pain patients with the non-cancer pain that had lasted six months or even more and the doctors surveyed included primary care physicians and the certain types of the specialists.
Not also the surprisingly and patients who’d already used medical marijuana were most supportive of expanded access the study found and the doctors and who said they’d never recommended medical cannabis for pain relief were the most reluctant to advocate for the broader access.
And however, the medical use of marijuana of pain appears to be here to stay and also the 70 percent of both the patients and the doctors and thought that medical schools be training future and the doctors on its use.
All of this the points to the need for the future guidance around cannabis use and efficacy and stone said and Is it something they should be recommending and if so are there different considerations for the types of the products or modes of use or concentration?