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New York Adding Chronic Pain as Medical Marijuana Qualify Condition

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Regulations are in development that will allow chronic pain sufferers to get a medical marijuana card.  The Department of Health is working on the proper regulations to add the condition and allow patients to obtain medical marijuana cards for chronic pain.

An amendment will be published along with a public commentary period in the near future, according to WGRZ 2 News. The addition of chronic pain will bring the list of qualifying ailments to 11 total. New York’s medical marijuana program is one of the strictest in the U.S., and receives a lot of criticism from patients.

Health Commissioner Howard Zucker said, “Medical marijuana is already helping thousands of patients across New York State, and adding chronic pain as a qualifying condition will help more patients and further strengthen the program.”

In November, the state decided that nurse practitioners and doctor assistants will be permitted to prescribe medical marijuana, instead of just doctors. New York has only five licensed grows. These grows are the only ones allowed to have a dispensary, with each company being allowed to have four dispensaries each. That is only 20 dispensaries for the entire state of New York.

Further expansions of the medical marijuana program, including expanding the number of certified companies, are expected in 2017.

Dr. Laszlo Mechtler of DENT Neurologic Institute reports that nearly 100-million Americans have chronic pain.  Dr. Mechtler said, “I’d rather have individuals on medical marijuana than I do with opiates. There has not been one certified death from overdose of medical marijuana. I think this is an exciting time for medical marijuana to step in to decrease the addiction rate, to decrease the overdose, and help our patients and our athletes and our students who have chronic pain.”

The doctor continued by saying, “There are CB1 receptors in the brain, more CB1 receptors than any other receptor in the body, and the presumption is that medical marijuana through THC and some CBD, which are the two main components of medical marijuana, affect it at the CB1 level.”