Page 34 - Demo

32 MEDICINAL CANNABIS FROM PAGE 31 Dr Jansen says medicinal cannabis is also prescribed for: • Palliative care. • Restless leg syndrome. • PTSD. • Parkinson’s disease. • Ulcerative colitis. • Migraines. • Tremor. • MS pain or spasms. • Dystonia otherwise undiagnosed. • Blood glucose control (“a couple of patients are on CBD for their diabetes”). • Insomnia. • Chemotherapy-induced nausea. • Autism. • Asperger’s syndrome. • Mood disorder. • Depression. • ADHD. • Schizophrenia. • Epilepsy. • Cystic fibrosis. • Crohn’s disease. • Other conditions. Dr Jansen agrees that a wide range of conditions can be managed with the aid of medicinal cannabis. “The reason why is that you have a system inside your body called the endo-cannabinoid system, which has to do with homeostasis and getting your body back to homeostatic levels of cellular happiness – cellular bliss,” he said, adding that boosting the endo-cannabinoid system “can benefit so many different things”. Mr Sinclair said: “While preliminary research around CBD suggests it may be therapeutically useful in anxiety and certain neurological disorders, the majority of research supporting its use is found for intractable epilepsy. “Due to cannabis research being stifled for the last 80 years due to prohibition, research does have some catching up to do, but it’s fair to say that cannabis research is currently experiencing a significant resurgence of interest. “Several clinical trials reporting efficacy data have shown that CBD can reduce seizure frequency in study participants for intractable epilepsy, and could represent hope for patients that are resistant to many of the conventional anti-epileptic drugs.” “The government is looking to change the scheduling of smaller bottles of CBD to across-the-counter pharmacy only (Schedule 3) ... so \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\[if this goes ahead\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\] pharmacists would have more of a role in dispensing CBD.” RETAIL PHARMACY ASSISTANTS • AUG 2020