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Cannabis as Medicine? Overview

It is utterly mind-blowing that people have no idea that Cannabis has been part of the medical prescription landscape for over 20 years. That’s right T. G. A (Therapeutic Goods Administration) trialled and approved cannabis based medicines have been available as an option to alleviate, if only in small ways, some of the symptoms of a couple of diseases or help with recovery from treatment. However, the claims of this plant being a ‘miracle cure’ for just about everything, have existed for of 100 years… yet in no credible and advanced research has any of the properties of the Cannabis plant ‘cured’ anything, ever!

There is no argument that some components of this incredibly complex plant can have some therapeutic benefit, be it ever so small, but deriving such from the plant with out co-opting some of the more detrimental components has proven incredibly difficult. On top of that, the evidence emerging from latest science, sees that some of these therapies, do more harm than good, with the temporary alleviating of a symptom on one hand, and incurring along term genetic harm on the other!

Again if facts and evidence matter to your best-practice health care, then this is the space for you. Make informed decisions based on science, and not quackery!

Doctors are being told not to use medicinal cannabis to treat patients with chronic pain, warning there is no solid evidence it is effective, as Australia’s medical regulator approves its 100,000th cannabinoid script.

The recommendation from the country’s peak pain advisory body to doctors is: “Do not prescribe currently available cannabinoid products to treat chronic non-cancer pain unless part of a registered clinical trial.”

The Faculty of Pain Medicine at the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (ANZCA) says there is no robust evidence from gold-standard studies that proves cannabinoid products effectively treat these patients’ suffering. Cannabinoids are the active chemicals in cannabis.

But the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) is allowing doctors to apply for special access to prescribe medicinal cannabis products. Proponents argue the substances should be given the benefit of the doubt and offered to patients on compassionate grounds.

Dean of ANZCA’s pain medicine faculty Professor Michael Vagg said medicinal cannabis products on the market “are not even close” to showing they are effective in the management of patients with complex chronic pain.

“The research available is either unsupportive of using cannabinoid products in chronic non-cancer pain or is of such low quality that no valid scientific conclusion can be drawn,” the pain specialist and physician said.

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