Expanding legal treatment options for medical marijuana in the State of Louisiana

Background: The use of cannabis for ‘medical’ purposes has expanded throughout the USA. Despite the limited peer-reviewed medical research, medical marijuana therapy has been to treat chronic pain, stimulate appetite, treat nausea, and ameliorate muscle spasticity. Challenge: In the state of Louisiana, this potential treatment is strictly controlled. The ability of the individual patient to receive this therapy is limited since any prescribing provider had to be both licensed by the state medical board and registered with the board to prescribe medical marijuana. Medical cannabis could be used only for limited medical disorders. The ‘Medical Marijuana’ HB819 bill authorizes the recommendation of medical marijuana for additional conditions and allows any state-licensed physician to recommend/prescribe medical marijuana. Alternative options: The government may consider working with the state medical board to lessen its regulation allowing a collaborative effort to formalize protocols for safe prescribing of medical marijuana. A more liberal option would be to make it available to the consumer over the counter, while a state tracking mechanism is set in place to limit the amount purchased. Conclusions: Two stakeholders pertaining to this new legislation to focus on are the Louisiana State government and healthcare providers. This law probably has the biggest impact on healthcare providers and their relationship to patients. This legislation may allow providers to have more ‘freedom in medical marijuana treatment plans’. These benefits would be monitored using such criteria as cost, access to care, as well as patient and healthcare provider satisfaction.