Category: States

[Editor’s Note – Dr. K’s findings are worth pursuing, and also need to be contextualized. We want transparency up-front. We’re interested in noting what should be pursued re the medicine and messaging, highlighting what’s interesting while not being an industry cheerleader. ]

Response Article Outline:

• Points of clarification about this study
• Here’s why it’s still interesting
• Here’s what we’d like to see done next

Call Notes – Juan and Steve

1) Headline is wider-reaching than the findings
2) Biased audience
3) Better to repeat statewide at point of contact with patients with additional rigors, a wider population / larger n (this one: 392), with less of the selection bias

[E.N. Great opportunity to speak to specifics as possible: proposing, e.g., a medical facility, specific staff, funding sources, would be a good challenge to the people involved — in medicine and politics — and also a way to promote your availability to participate in the follow-up study you propose.]

Majority of patient condition-specifics and findings cluster around pain, inflammation — most / stronger evidence in this study than other meds / conditions

30% didn’t disclose their cannabis usage to their doctor

[E.N. Great opportunity to speak to why this is not optimal patient behavior]

Small % of patients used medical cannabis when there are existing FDA-approved options:

2.5% used for chemo-induced nausea / appetite promotion
Why not FDA-approved Marinol, Dranabinol
3.8% used for seizure – Why not FDA-approved Epidiolex

References:

Medical Cannabis Users’ Comparisons between Medical Cannabis and Mainstream Medicine

Related article Adam referenced:
Medical Cannabis Use Is Associated With Decreased Opiate Medication Use in a Retrospective Cross-Sectional Survey of Patients With Chronic Pain.

[E.N. Responding to the latter could be a separate article to keep the first article in response to Dr. K tight and straightforward. The hooks include showing UMich pride and changing the conversation about cannabis where there’s fact-based pushback regarding “cannabis as off-ramp vs gateway drug.” It’s completely up to you and your time available — use what you want and how.]

Next Steps

• Juan drafts response article under his byline per the above notes
• SMc assigns copy- and photo-editors to collaborate with Juan
• SMc pitches this draft to Amy B @ MLive; [others]
• Will pitch it before we publish to allow Amy the chance at an exclusive for 48 hours
• Once published on MLive, Extroverting, or another property, we’ll promote it on social, especially to elected officials and medical professionals with whom we had contact in the run-up to GW’s Science Symposium