Canadian doctors given advice on prescribing medical pot

The College of Family Physicians is issuing guidelines to Canada’s 30,000 primary-care doctors about which patients should and should not get prescriptions for medical marijuana.

The organization says there is no evidence supporting the use of cannabis for low back pain or fibromyalgia, but it can be considered for nerve-damage pain caused by such conditions as metastatic cancer, shingles and injury.

But the college says that even with such neuropathic pain, doctors should consider using medical pot only after trying standard medications and therapies.

The guidelines say patients under 25, those with substance abuse or cardiovascular disease, and women who are pregnant, planning to become pregnant or breastfeeding should not be prescribed marijuana.

And family doctors should regularly monitor the patient’s response to treatment and discontinue authorization for cannabis use if the herb is clearly ineffective or causing harm.

Health Canada changed its regulations in April to put prescribing of therapeutic marijuana in the hands of physicians, while supply of the dried herb was handed over to licensed growers for distribution to patients.

College CEO Dr. Francine Lemire says the lack of research into cannabis has left many doctors unsure about which patients could benefit from medical-grade weed and what dose should be prescribed.

Source The star.com Canada