How To Find A Medical Marijuana Doctor? It is as important to find a marijuana doctor as a primary care physician for you. Your top priority should be a doctor who can be reached easily. Once you successfully find a marijuana doctor for yourself, you need to ask a few questions before using cannabis as part of your healthcare regimen.
What is the educational background of the physician?
Most of the places where cannabis is legal to use and they have practicing marijuana doctors, those places need their doctors to have MD, DO, or advanced nurse practitioner assistant degree. Before they certify patients for cannabis cards, they need to have a strong practicing background. They need to be well aware of the variety of medical conditions in which using weed becomes inevitable.
For instance, a patient may seek a medical marijuana card to get rid of anxiety. In this scenario, the Doctor should assess the patient. Understanding other psychotropic drugs, the interaction of drugs, and helping the patient withdraw from other medications. Dr. Melanie Bone, a cannabis specialist explained. “Cannabis is perceived to be so safe that adding it to what the patient is already doing does not seem risky. Not so. However, most doctors do not know enough about Cannabis to recommend it. It means that the patient’s regular doctor is not involved. It is common for them to send the patient to a known cannabis practice without asking for or getting feedback until their next annual visit.
The difference:
How To Find A Medical Marijuana Doctor Patients need to do some research before selecting a cannabis doctor. According to Dr. Bone, “Sadly, some cannabis practitioners do not always have a lot of education or experience with cannabinoid medicine either. A doctor’s patchwork of basic educational requirements and re-certification laws that vary from state to state. You can become a certifying practitioner in some states for a few hundred dollars and a few hours of basic cannabis education. For this reason, becoming a practitioner is not hard to do and can be lucrative in the same way ‘pill mills’ were. Less educated or motivated marijuana doctors may instruct a patient to ‘try a few things’ and then have them back to see what worked and what did not. There is some truth to the need for a trial and error approach, but it should be predicated on good basic guidance.”
Can I get medical advice at dispensaries?
Because people do not like doing research, they end up asking their budtenders to guide them at dispensaries. Most of the dispensary staff is well trained to understand the endocannabinoid system. They are also well aware with the role cannabinoids play. But one thing is certain that budtenders are not familiar with physiology, pharmacology, endocrinology, psychiatry, pain management, and the other specialized areas.
Dr. bone states:
They also are not privy to a patient’s comorbidities. The number of times I have suggested that a patient starts with a certain product for various reasons. Their abuse of opiates, alcohol, antidepressants, and blood thinners. They were getting a call about side effects within a day or two of starting their cannabis. More often than not, these folks left the paper I gave them suggesting how to use cannabis. (e.g., sublingual drops or topical cream) at home and relied on the advice of the budtender who suggested something else, usually higher in THC, which caused panic or rapid heartbeat.
A patient should only take medical assistance from a certified medical practitioner because trained dispensary staff market and sell products.
What are red flags to like for in a medical marijuana doctor?
If you find following things in the physician, keep searching for another physician:
- Limited years of experience. It may be prudent to seek a physician with at least two years of clinical experience.
- Any medical board sanctions for improper or unethical behavior.
- Tight scheduling, or booking new patient consultations every 15 minutes and only spending a few minutes on each appointment.
- Large numbers of negative online reviews or a glut of suspiciously glowing reviews.
- Unconventional advertising, such as posting flyers in the neighborhood.
It is dangerous to think about skipping the state requirements while selecting a medical cannabis doctor.
Choosing the best medical marijuana doctor:
Many experienced cannabis doctors guide their patients about the specific disease the patient is suffering from. Dr. Bone says, “The only way cannabis medicine will become more mainstream is if we develop best care delivery, models. The only way to do that is to collect data from diligent practitioners. Ultimately, this process may then inform using cannabinoids as a part of everyday health and wellness. In addition to treating ailments, such as severe epilepsy, for which we use it now.”
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