In an article published in April that just came to our attention, Brianna Wellen shared her and other patients troubles of getting a license needed to acquire medical cannabis in the state of Illinois. To make things clear Brianna and the others don’t just have little discomforts that they want to stop with cannabis they have very serious diseases that cause lots of pain and depression deriving from that pain. As Brianna explains;

“When medical cannabis was legalized in Illinois last November, I thought I was a shoo-in for the program. I’d been undergoing treatment for stage-three Hodgkin’s lymphoma for six months, and had already been offered a prescription for the THC supplement Marinol by my physician. I also had symptoms that were supposed to be helped by medical marijuana use: nausea, loss of appetite, and neuropathy. But it wasn’t so simple; my quest for the elusive green card has so far taken three physicians, five months, and $450. And I still don’t
have one. It turns out I’m not alone. According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, only 16.7 percent of patients, or 5,000 out of the nearly 30,000 who have started an application for the medical cannabis pilot program, have been approved.”

Just horrible stuff here. A patient with cancer who is clearly suffering has to suffer and spend even more because hospitals and doctors aren’t even willing to help the people that medical marijuana was designed to help. It’s hard to contain my rage in this case. This reeks of officials being forced by voters to rightly implement medical marijuana but clearly don’t want to follow the spirit of that new law. The writer used some telling stats from the Illinois Department of Health to back up her claim.

“According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, only 16.7 percent of patients, or 5,000 out of the nearly 30,000 who have started an application for the medical cannabis pilot program, have been approved. Physician approval is a common hurdle. The Healing Clinic, a full-service advocacy center for medical marijuana patients with locations in Chicago and Highland Park, surveyed 400 Illinois doctors and found that 82 percent of them are not approving patients. The main reason doctors cited was a lack of research in support of the treatment, but some also expressed fear of repercussions from the medical board regarding their medical licenses.”

The cite of lack of research may seem justifiable but even though there’s still some push and pull between how much medical cannabis helps patients the evidence seems pretty clear. It’s a great way to help ease both physical and mental pain. Hospitals don’t even seem to take this law that seriously considering some of their officials are confused about whether they even have a policy on it.

“I asked UIC Medical Center and Thorek Memorial Hospital in Buena Park about their stances regarding medical cannabis, and the question was met with confusion about whether an official policy was even in place; representatives from both responded by saying they weren’t certain their hospital gives cards out. A spokesperson from Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center responded with a vague official statement: “Our goal is to assist patients on their path back to health. Physicians work with each patient to determine the best treatment plan in order to achieve this.”

Here’s an even sadder tale of a patient being failed by her doctors, the hospital and the state:

“Nancy Chacon was also denied certification by her doctor at Northwestern, despite having two qualifying ailments: fibromyalgia and Crohn’s disease. “Pretty much from the first appointment, [my physician] was suggesting that I try cannabis because I was on Percocet,” Chacon says. “She said, ‘You should take medical cannabis, but I won’t be prescribing it for you. Yes, this would be good for you, get it from anyone else.’ ” So at age 38, Chacon found herself trying street drugs for the first time, literally meeting strangers in alleys to buy weed to try to ease her pain.”

The doctor recognizes that his patient could very much use medical cannabis to ease her pain but is too much a coward to do it himself. So he basically closes his eyes to her pain and makes her go somewhere else to spend hundreds of dollars she might not be able to afford to spend, which includes this useless visit with this doctor telling her one thing and then not doing it. So she understandably turns to the black market and street dealers to try and help herself. When drug dealers on the street are doing a better job of helping patients pain than doctors and hospitals your medical marijuana program is broken. And it’s not broken because marijuana is causing unforeseen hazards or health problems, it’s broken because the state, hospitals, and doctors have failed. Here’s another patient embarrassingly failed by the state.

“Wesley Tyler was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2014, and has regularly experienced numbness and tingling in his hands and feet as well as trouble with his vision because of an inflammation in his brain that pushes on his optical nerve. Through his own research, he decided to seek out medical marijuana to ease his pain. “My physician is very old-fashioned, and I actually dreaded the thought of asking him,” Tyler says. “Doing Internet searches, I found many places around Chicago claiming to assist in getting through the application process. Most of them turned out to be extremely expensive just to get in the door.”

A patient was afraid to ask her own doctor for help with her pain. This is just a sad statement on where we are as a state. Not one person can or will die from THC overdose. It has been proven to help with appetite, especially for patients going through draining chemo sessions or ones with horrible stomach problems. In fact some have even considered fleeing for greener pastures, literally and figuratively.

“For others, the journey to a card has been even more difficult. Mike Mortensen’s five-year-old daughter, Chloe, was born with chromosomal deletion syndrome—a loss of parts of chromosomes in the copying of DNA that causes severe birth defects and significant intellectual and physical disability. As a result she was unable to walk or talk, suffered from seizures, and had self-destructive tendencies. Multiple doctors, including specialists at the Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, denied Chloe approval because of a lack of research regarding the effectiveness of such treatment for the condition. The Mortensen family was about to pick up and move to California, where it’s easier to obtain medical marijuana.”

It’s very sad that this family was on the verge of having to pick up their whole lives and move it to California because doctors and hospitals won’t do what their intended to do. I guess this isn’t surprising since this blog just this week talked about how the director of the Illinois department of Health was trying to stop a veteran with post traumatic stress disorder from getting medical cannabis. Luckily the judge shut him down and luckily for the Mortenson family the Healing Clinic was able to give them what they need, still at a cost though. The family thankfully saw a great uptick in Chloe’s health since being able to get THC treatment for her. Still, the results seem worth it even to those who’ve had to wait.

“Chloe “was a child who didn’t play with toys,” Mortensen says. “Now that she’s on [medical cannabis], she actually sits down, plays with toys, sits and watches movies. Her seizures have pretty much stopped.” Chloe’s dispensary, Greenhouse, in Deerfield, has even reached out to cultivators to create a special cannabis gummy bear just for Chloe.”

That’s just one of the many stories of how medical cannabis has helped ailing patients at least regain some of their happiness and former selves. It’s truly sad that Illinois doctors and hospitals don’t see it this way.