Today I took care of a 58 year old women who suffered from Sjogrens Syndrome and Rheumatoid Arthritis who had tried medical marijuana recently and found relief of her symptoms. Her arthritis mostly affected her hands and shoulders and required multiple drugs for pain management. She had been on Bextra then Vioxx then Celebrex but had to stop all of them because of kidney disease. She was at her “wits end” and wanted an alternative to help her get some relief and sleep throughout the night.

An important study just came out in the periodical “Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes” which demonstrated an increased risk of fatal and non-fatal heart attack and stroke for healthy patients who routinely use NSAIDS (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) such as motrin, ibuprofen, diclofenac, voltaren, celebrex, naprosyn, aleve etc. to treat pain. This is a very important study and you those patients who routinely pop motrins or take dicofenac to treat pain need to read. Marijuana has for many years been found to have potent anti-inflammatory effects without any of the increased risks associated with commonly prescribed NSAID’s.

As physicians we take an oath that states: “First do no harm.” Unfortunately as doctors we have to many times rely on data that has been produced and evaluated by drug companies that stand to make HUGE profits from the sale of these drugs. A 32 billion dollar per year company, named Pfizer, is just one of many that knowingly distributed a pill that was harmful to patients. It is for this reason that so many patients DO NOT WANT TO TAKE PILLS and rely on a more natural remedy like cannabis.