“It’s morning in Nahariya, a tiny Israeli town near the Lebanese border, and 4-year-old Benjamin is repeatedly smashing his head against the wall.
“He spins wildly in circles, screeching at full volume. As his mother tries frantically to calm him, he pulls down his pants and defecates on the floor.
“That was in October 2016, and typical of most days at the time. Sharon, a single mother who moved to Israel from the United States one year earlier, was alone and losing control. Benjamin was taking Ritalin, a drug usually associated with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), which he did not have. He’d also tried the antipsychotic ziprasidone and a mix of antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs. None of them helped, and he often became more hyperactive as they wore off.
All that changed a year ago, when Benjamin started taking marijuana…
December 14th Iowa will vote to add autism for children with severe pediatric autism.
People who are autistic are brilliant and can achieve extraordinary things within their communities.
Those with the most severe forms more than deserve a chance to have some fucking privacy.
Trying marijuana with their educated physicians should, from my perspective, be a human right.
Iowa doctors without testicular fortitude are advised to find some. The State is doing all your homework man, so chill out. Literally. You are not responsible for giving any information to patients unless the State provides it for you. You are not violating federal law and are in the most protected state in the country. The State’s assistant attorney general explained everything you could possibly need to know and if she missed anything you are free to ask questions — read her legal explanation for physicians here and share with your colleagues please if you are somehow reading this blog.
Get educated, and do your minimal standard of care, please, without waiting for the State to get enough resources to do the job for you. Patients will take marijuana whether you like it or not and you owe it to them to understand the drug interactions. The State will be giving you documentation so you don’t have to do your own research.
Here’s some mainstream media coverage of Iowa’s recent news that autism is being considered.
PS — About Peter Komendowski. Take his job.
From the Des Moines Register:
“Board member Robert Shreck, a Des Moines oncologist, told his colleagues the 3 percent THC limit is imperfect but should stay in place for the time being.
“I think it’s a fair compromise the state made. It allows a variety of products to be distributed. People can try them … and see what it does for them,” Shreck said.
“The board voted to recommend the state add severe pediatric autism to the list of ailments for which Iowans may legally purchase medical marijuana products. But the board declined patients’ requests to also add attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder and ganglioglioma, which is a type of brain tumor.
“Board members said their main reason for declining to expand the list of approved ailments is there isn’t enough research to show medical marijuana products would help. For bipolar disorder and PTSD, some of the doctors said marijuana could make symptoms worse for some patients.”
Read the full article here
I have bipolar. If these fucks would understand that marijuana has a fine point that needs tuned, and is individual for everyone, then they wouldn’t say stupid black and white shit like “marijuana can make it worse.” There’s a spectrum. And understanding the science behind terpenes and cannabinoid science is crucial, which is why we’re starting to do book reviews from PhD doctors on marijuana’s latest international science, since you assholes are too scared to frontally do so and have to constantly check with each other if it’s ok to read outside the legally accepted (read: extremely limited) research protocols allowed under the restrictive Schedule One “laws.” This entire thing can be alleviated if you would come down off your “high” horse and sober the hell up, but your politicians you send to the Capitol are too busy getting DUI’s to give a shit about me.
From Psychedelic Times:
When Treating Bipolar Disorder with Cannabis, Research Suggests the Amount of CBD May Be Key
Earlier this year, a contributor to the United Patients Group blog wrote about his son’s struggle to find an effective treatment for bipolar disorder. After four years of nearly annual hospitalization, cannabis was the only option that seemed to help. “From his first puff I could see immediate mood improvements,” the father wrote. But interestingly, he also felt that his son’s habit of smoking “street pot” had increased his psychosis, even provoking manic episodes.
How is it that the same plant could both agitate and alleviate his son’s symptoms? The key to effective treatment, the father argued, was in the chemical makeup of one particular cannabis strain they’d found—it had high amounts of cannabidiol (CBD), one of the principal cannabinoids in marijuana.
The Connection Between Cannabis and Bipolar Disorder
Research into the relationship between cannabis and bipolar disorder has resulted in contradictory results: some studies say using cannabis improves cognitive functions, with patients reporting that it works better than conventional drugs to treat their mania and depression. But other studies suggest it increases depressive symptoms and that continued use of cannabis is associated with a higher occurrence of manic episodes. And there’s the risk, too, of dependence and drug abuse—research has found that people with bipolar disorder are 6.8 times more likely to have a history of illicit marijuana use than the rest of the population.
Despite all this, the father from the United Patients Group may have been onto something. While case studies on cannabis’ effects have been mixed, there’s a lot of evidence that CBD has the same antipsychotic and anticonvulsive properties as conventional bipolar disorder treatments. In other words, the chemical makeup of the strain you use does seem to matter.
So since the chemical makeup of the strains you use matters, people like me, who have used marijuana on again off again, especially seasonally, for ten years, have learned.
Here’s Leafly’s strain guide for bipolar disorder.
LEAFLY:
Cannabis Strains That Help With Bipolar Disorder
Use the filters below to find an ideal cannabis strain.
Study Finds CBD Alleviates Psychotic Disorder Symptoms
Stop thinking black and white. Medicine is a spectrum.
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