People usually know marijuana as a drug that they smoke or eat to get high. It comes from the Cannabis sativa plant. Federal law makes it illegal to have marijuana on your person. Medical marijuana means using marijuana to treat some health problems. Over half of the states have made medical marijuana Louisiana legal.
How Do You Use Medical Marijuana?
Medical marijuana may be:
- Smoked
- Vaporized
- Eaten
- Taken as a liquid extract
Cannabinoids are chemicals that are found in the leaves and buds of marijuana. THC is a type of cannabinoid that works on the brain and can change your mood or state of mind.
Cannabinoids can be found in different amounts in different types of marijuana. Because of this, it can be hard to predict or control the effects of medical marijuana. The effects may also be different if you smoke it or eat it.
What Kinds Of Problems Can It Help?
Medical marijuana may be used to:
- Lessen pain. This includes different kinds of long-term pain, like pain from damaged nerves.
- Stop feeling sick and puking. The most common use is for chemotherapy-related nausea and vomiting.
- Make a person feel like eating. This helps people who don’t eat enough and lose weight because of other illnesses, like HIV/AIDS or cancer.
A few small studies suggest that marijuana might help people with:
- Multiple sclerosis
- Crohn’s illness
- Bowel disease that causes swelling
- Epilepsy
When someone with glaucoma smokes marijuana, the pressure inside their eyes goes down. But the effect doesn’t last long. There may be better ways to treat glaucoma with other drugs.
How Do People Get Medical Marijuana?
In states where medical marijuana is legal, you need a written statement from your doctor or other health care provider to get the drug. It should say that you need it to treat a medical problem or to make side effects less bad. Your name will be put on a list that lets you buy marijuana from a licensed seller.
What Kinds Of Health Problems Qualify?
Only people with certain conditions can get medical marijuana. Different states have different laws about what conditions marijuana can treat. Some of the most common are:
- Cancer
- HIV/AIDS
- Seizures and epilepsy
- Glaucoma
- Long-lasting, severe pain
- Extreme sickness
- A lot of weight loss and feeling weak (wasting syndrome)
- Severe muscle spasms
- Multiple sclerosis
Side Effects
Some of the things that might happen to your body if you use marijuana are:
- A heartbeat that is fast or doesn’t beat normally
- Dizziness
- Sluggish responses
- Drowsiness
- Some mental or emotional side effects that might happen are:
- A strong feeling of well-being or happiness
- Loss of short-term memory
- Having trouble focusing
- Confusion
- Less or more anxiousness
Who Shouldn’t Use Marijuana For Medical Reasons?
No one under the age of 18 can get a prescription for medical marijuana. Also, the following people shouldn’t use medical marijuana:
- Heart disease sufferers
- Pregnant women
- People who have had psychosis before
Other worries about using marijuana are:
- Driving dangerously or doing other dangerous things
- Lung irritation
- Marijuana dependence or addiction