Cannabis has been used as medicine for centuries throughout the world. In ancient times it was a trial and error approach to determine if something had therapeutic value. As the field of medicine evolved, research protocols were developed and safety standards set. Modern research on the efficacy of cannabis as medicine was halted with its prohibition. With the advent of the War on Drugs, the focus of any research on cannabis was limited to the potential harmful effects of marijuana.

The first endogenous cannabinoid, arachidonylethanolamide or Anandamide (a Sanskrit word meaning blissful amide) was found in Dr. Mechoulam’s labratory in Israel in 1992. This discovery built on the idea that when receptors were found there had to be an endogenous ligand that would be the key to its use. Back in Mechoulam’s lab a second endocannabinoid called 2-arachidonylglycerol (2-AG) was discovered in 1995.

In the spring of 2001 in Missoula, MT, four (Irv Rosenfeld, George McMahon, Elvy Musikka, and Barbara Douglass) of the 6 remaining federal medical marijuana patients underwent an extensive three-day examination of every system in their body to determine the long term effects of cannabis. Known widely as The Missoula Chronic Use Study, the investigators concluded that after using cannabis therapeutically for a range of 11 to 27 years, with a dose of nine cured ounces per month for Barbara and others, and eleven cured ounces every 26 days for Irv, they were all in fine condition exempting their original illness and the wear and tear of age. We assume that the federal government never bothered to conduct such long-term studies because it did not want to scientifically validate the efficacy of cannabis. A thorough review of the study was published in the Journal of Cannabis Therapeutics and is available here in PDF – Chronic Cannabis Use in the Compassionate Investigational New Drug Program: An Examination of Benefits and Adverse Effects of Legal Clinical Cannabis

ain is the number one reason people seek medical attention, and patients seeking pain relief are the most prevalent group employing cannabis medicines. Chronic pain seriously interferes with the quality of life for many patients. For some, strong prescription pain medications (opioids) have provided them relief. Unfortunately several problems can follow with the use of opioids on a long term basis. Patients may soon develop a tolerance to the analgesic effects, thus requiring ever increasing doses. Chronic use of opioids also causes unwanted side effects that include such problems as constipation, feeling drugged, nauseated, and depressed. Countless self-reports from chronic pain patients who use cannabis for pain management show a common theme. 

Patients Out of Time strongly believes that there has been more than enough research to validate that cannabis is a safe and effective medication. If not for the reefer madnessin the 1930s that led to the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, which marked the beginning of the cannabis prohibition and the removal of cannabis from the pharmacopoedia, cannabis would have been grandfathered into modern medicine as was aspirin.