The survey was sent to 435 patients who purchased the medication in the first three months of the program, and slightly more than half of those patients completed the survey.
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Nearly three-quarters of surveyed medical marijuana patients said that the biggest drawback of the state’s program is that it’s unaffordable.
About 90 percent of the patients responding to the survey reported mild to significant benefits, the state Health Department reported Monday. For one, only 27 percent of the health care providers responded, and secondly, “reports of patient benefits by certifying health care practitioners were generally more modest than patients’ own reports”, the health department noted. Although benefits were reported for all of those conditions, patients with cancer reported the highest scores, while the practitioners indicated that they had observed the greatest benefit from the treatments among their patients with muscle spasms.
“It is expensive and unaffordable for many parts of our population”, Arneson said.
One interesting benefit reported by the practitioners was a reduction in the need for other pain medications.
Ninety percent of patients that responded said medical cannabis provided substantial relief while just 20 percent reported experiencing side effects like dry mouth, fatigue and “feeling stoned”, as the Star Tribune reports. None of the side effects were life-threatening, although four patients (2 percent) reported an increase in seizures.
A new study has found no link between regular, long-term marijuana use and physical health issues, with the exception of a higher incidence of gum disease.
“How much of this is the placebo factor, we don’t know, although it’s probably quite a bit of it”, he said. Dr. Hill is a marijuana addiction expert and assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, whose new commentary on the study is published Tuesday in JAMA.
Patients say medical cannabis helps, but high costs present barriers..
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Researchers, led by Madeline Meier of Arizona State University, followed 1,037 New Zealanders from birth until they turned 38.
