How to speak to your Doctor about Cannabis medicine?

My greatest wish is to share Cannabis medicine information with as many people as possible because without doubt Cannabis cures cancer and it is now a well-known fact that Cannabis has effectively killed all the different types of cancer cells that science has tested to date. [24] (Weeks, 2018) My traditional healer teachers used to always say that eventually medical doctors will learn about Cannabis medicine straight from their patients.

In my work the most important aspect about Cannabis medicine has always been the fact that the main target of THC is our brain. There is a potent natural and somewhat mystical affinity between this fat soluble molecule and the human brain which is made up of over 60% fat, so there is a biological link for THC to specifically focus on the human brain.  

The second most important aspect is that the Endocannabinoid system or ECS essentially controls our Endocrine system which is part of the body’s main control mechanism and controls our hormone system. The main function of the Endocrine system is also homeostasis and these two systems work alongside each other in defending the body from unnatural imbalance from external environmental sources. We now know that in fact the ECS is the body's 'super computer' and modulates every single physiological system in the human body. 

Some other crucial considerations when working with this medicine is understanding receptor expression, individual treatment plans, the regulatory role of Cannabis in the Endocrine and Chakra system, micro-dosing as well as the relationship between Cannabis and the sun. When there is illness or injury in the body it imperatively calls our EC systems to bring healing. If the EC system is compromised or deficient for whatever reason for example stress it should not surprise anyone that plant derived Cannabinoids are the only true therapy for effective healing.

The Secrets of Cannabis Medicine

·         The brain is the main target of THC

·         Dual healing purpose

·         Retrograde transmission

·         Receptor expression

·         Individual treatment programs

·         Micro dosing

·         Endocrine and Chakra system regulation

·         Tachion energy

·         The Entourage Effect

Vitamin D absorption 

The challenge of convincing doctors…

No approved medicine has ever been prescribed through the delivery system of smoking and we can see from the explosion of studies all over the world, that cancer patients and even patients with other medical conditions, mostly all report achieving better results from the smoke inhalation process than through ingestion. 

But let us not forget that as recently as the late 1970's medical doctors were encouraging patients to smoke cigarettes to help with stress and relaxation.

Doctors and patients need to be aware of the protective role Cannabis plays in the lungs against tobacco damage in the exact same way as it protects the liver from alcohol damage and this is why I always say that smoking Cannabis is still safer than not smoking at all and many doctors cringe when I make this statement. This is how scientists declared the need to develop non-smoked and fast working delivery systems. To be fair THC and Cannabis is probably the last thing any doctor would think about when dealing with say for instance asthma or lung cancer. So a lot of doctors might struggle with the idea of prescribing medicine to be delivered via smoking. The truth is that we have known since before the 1970’s that Cannabis has the ability to help open airways in the lungs.

We know that Cannabis is a bronchodilator and this is why even smoking Cannabis is able to help a lot of asthma patients. It is not likely that the medical world will ever accept a medicine which needs to be smoked. But eventually doctors will realise that often times this is the most effective way to consume this medicine for instant relief of so many day to day problems. In the future patients who are used to smoking Cannabis for medicinal purposes will most likely find very little benefit in some synthetic versions. You can see how this uncovers a potential turning point for the way in which the world thinks about Cannabis medicine. Patients who prefer to puff also mostly report that it is easier to control the individual dosage through smoking because the effects are instant. This is because THC directly and immediately targets the brain and through the smoking of Cannabis THC reaches the brain as quickly as the plant molecule crosses the blood brain barrier which in most people is instant. 

With ingestion the effects can take hours to ‘kick in’ and for common ailments like insomnia, nausea, pain, menstrual problems, blood pressure, stress, anxiety and so on just a few puffs is usually enough to solve most problems and this is true for many people everywhere in the world. You don’t need to be a scientist to realise that if Cannabis was freely available to the ordinary person in the street that in fact the pharmaceutical industry would stand a very good chance of shrinking.

We must stop thinking of Cannabis as a ‘drug’ and the plant needs to be removed from the legal system and not carry any type of scheduling and there really ought to be a worldwide moratorium on international Cannabis laws. Right now there is a tremendous amount of confusion about the Cannabis situation. There are many different definitions of the word ‘drug’ and Cannabis is not one of them.  Cannabis is also not a gateway drug …there are no gateway drugs there are just ‘drugs’ and if ever there was a gateway drug it would have to be cigarettes so it’s hard to believe that not so long ago medical doctors were used to endorse cigarette smoking as though nicotine itself was a medicine.

As far as I am concerned the only connection between ‘drugs’ and Cannabis is that through prohibition ordinary people have been forced to seek out drug dealers to obtain a natural herb which our bodies need and which we could all simply grow in a pot on the window sill for free.  This is exactly how Cannabis became a ‘gateway drug’ by keeping it illegal and forcing  young people straight into the drug dens and this is how they are introduced to the serious ‘drugs’. These days Cannabis medicine can be effectively administered in many different ways so asthmatics for example can now inhale Cannabis medicine with a vaping device. Doctors shouldn’t fear because in fact smoking a joint may soon be the least common method of dosing Cannabis medicine and other routes of administration include inhalation, oral, topically, sublingual and rectal with suppositories.

You are not ill ~ you are Cannabis Deficient…

Right now there is more medical evidence in favour of the therapeutic potential of Cannabis than there is for any of the most popular conventional remedies currently on the market. And Cannabis is implicated in 678 medical conditions including corona virus. 

There is no shortage of experts who also now believe that the psychoactive properties of Cannabis are most likely to only be short lived and in fact do not present any risk of brain damage which in itself is contradictory in light of all the knowledge we now have of how Cannabis actually directly targets the brain to generate new brain cells and this is why we are having so much success in treating brain cancers and other conditions of the brain with Cannabis medicine.

Scientists have already labelled this deficiency as Clinical Endocannabinoid Deficiency (CECD) also known as Endocannabinoid Deficiency Syndrome. If the medical world sees fit to tag a condition as “Cannabis Deficiency” then surely we must all realise that we are required to consume Cannabis in order to maintain our health. A lot of people cannot really understand why millions of people with life-threatening diseases especially small children suffering from cancer, epilepsy and HIV are legally denied access to a natural plant medicine which people could be growing for free. 

No one should be denied Cannabis in light of all the research we can all access in this day and age and it is easy to understand why so many people feel that they are quite literally being legislated out of their own health and well- being.

We have already seen how deficiencies can cause some serious health problems for example vitamin and iron deficiencies can both cause havoc on the body’s systems and so too when our body is deprived of Cannabinoids when under attack from whatever reason, we begin to see deterioration of systems and organs which often manifests in one or another form of cancer. It has always been my understanding that cancer is really just Cannabis deficiency and you can see the results where this plant is able to heal most cancers within 90 days to the amazement of conventional doctors. This is the power of the human companion plant.

Is it possible to be allergic and addicted to Cannabis?

A lot of people have had ‘bad experiences’ with Cannabis and usually there are other chemicals involved like alcohol which will send most people into a state of ‘green fever’. In fact alcohol is the only real antagonist to Cannabis and these two should not be used together. Cannabis is a medicine and doesn’t deserve to be treated like a party drug and this is why I have always believed that all recreational use is also medicinal use whether the person realises it or not because healing is taking place regardless. People use Cannabis to feel better to eat better, to sleep better to be pain free, to relax and to be less stressed and these are all genuine medical conditions which we know Cannabis can cure. People must respect the human companion plant and the way it works inside our bodies and brains because we need Cannabis for our health. We must be open and honest when discussing Cannabis allergies because a person who has a ‘reaction’ is often times the same person who was simply consumed more THC than they could handle.

This is not an allergy and maybe we need to look closer at the human condition of addiction instead…the condition of wanting to get ‘more high’ for whatever reasons. The potential to abuse any substance be it coffee, sugar, cocaine or Cannabis is directly related to the severity of the persons pain which they are wanting to escape through their substance of choice. If you look close you will see that societies which have higher stress levels also have high addiction statistics so definitely stress is relative to the increase in addictions we are seeing today. When we do not respect Cannabis we ourselves exploit the potential to abuse our most valuable companion on earth. It is true that the psychedelic properties of THC can come upon you very suddenly and strike you full force in mid-sentence. This is why we absolutely have to respect the dose, the plant and most importantly ourselves when consuming Cannabis medicine. If we do not respect all of these then we risk abusing Cannabis so my best advice for doctors and patients is to begin with less and build up slowly when testing Cannabis medicine.

It is very important to understand that synthetic cannabinoid products work differently to plant derived medicine and generally have a much higher THC potency than whole herbal plant material. In chapter 1 we learnt how the receptors function but what is really important for doctors to know is that synthetic Cannabis products act as FULL agonists of the Cannabis receptors where the plant chemicals only act as PARTIAL agonists and this is why synthetics are more potent because they are engineered to operate differently to the natural molecules found in the whole plant and this is proving to be a disadvantage. And pretty soon doctors will have to explain to patients why synthetics do not work as well as the actual plant and why synthetics have side effects when the plant does not. So reactions to synthetic Cannabis drugs cannot constitute allergies but are actually side effects of man-made pharmaceutical products. We are even hearing stories of people taking synthetic CBD drops and breaking out in hives but yet when they smoke the plant nothing happens.

In my work I have had to help patients who had already taken synthetic cannabis products for example those so called CBD products available in the UK, to obtain plant based medicine because the synthetics had not worked.  This is a common experience with people suffering from various auto-immune diseases. Cannabis really is the best friend of our immune systems and when it comes to treating auto-immune conditions it seems certain that only whole herbal plant medicine will be truly effective. The EC system needs Cannabis to ensure a healthy immune system. We really need to differentiate between genuine Cannabis allergy symptoms and allergic reactions to substances found in Cannabis which are not actually naturally found in Cannabis for example pesticides, mould and fungal contamination. 

In my opinion there is no such thing as ‘Cannabis hyperemeresis’  which doctors claim is when a person smokes too much Cannabis. It is a well-known fact that many growers use neem oil for pest control and just because it is organic does not mean it is safe. The active ingredient is Azadirachtin and it is very poisoness. It is shocking to learn that over 50% of all Cannabis supplied to dispensaries is contaminated with azadirachtin. [25] (Karimi, 2018) If you look closely at the symptoms of this so called syndrome they are exactly the same as neem oil poisoining. Nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pain, muscle tension, fatigue and deyhdration.  Some people are so sensitive to neem oil that seizures and organ damage can also occur. Billions of people worldwide will suffer from some sort of allergic reaction every year be it food, pollen (hay fever), mould, peanuts, even pets and so on. Some people are even allergic to water. So it is no coincidence that as more people consume Cannabis we are beginning to see an increase in so called ‘allergies’.

There are many studies available indicating that Cannabis is an ‘emerging allergen’ so definitely you can start to see the trend to ‘introduce’ us to Cannabis allergies. People working in the synthetic cannabis industry are starting to pick up skin problems and irritations alledgedly from working with the whole plant. First of all…these employees should be wearing gloves, hair coverering and protective clothing to prevent cross contamination to plant material and second we would need to seriously look at the role of pesticides and other chemicals used in the growing process.  Because even protective clothing cannot save you from the poisonous chemicals some growers use relentlessly. Sadly in business ‘time is money’ so for sure there are chemicals being used to ‘speed up’ the growing process which is the same story as with our commercial food supply. 

Can Cannabis cure stress?

Most doctors can agree that stress and processed food are the two worst enemies in our lives and a lot of our physical ills are directly related to life stresses and toxic food products. We now know that it has been acknowledged by scientists that chronic stress can block many of our receptors including our Cannabinoid receptors. The production of Endocannabinoids in our bodies affect our cognition, emotion and behavior and has been scientifically linked to the real reduction of pain and anxiety, increase in appetite, and general feelings of well-being and so in tests carried out on rats researchers found that chronic stress in fact reduced the production of Endocannabinoids as well as the receptors. In times of increased stress and anxiety I always tell my patients to “double their dose” of Cannabis medicine to compensate for this unnatural reduction of our own Endocannabinoids. 

So stress makes you Cannabinoid deficient and by administering Cannabis to these rats it was found that symptoms of anxiety and depression were alleviated. It’s the exact same with humans, if you give a depressed person a little bit of Cannabis and they will definitely start to feel better. Patients who gain relief of their stress and anxiety symptoms by consuming Cannabis are really just supplementing a deficiency in their EC system by using phyto cannabinoids from the Cannabis plant to produce more of our own Cannabinoids and receptors to restore balance.

When we are experiencing stress our bodies produce stress hormones, one of these is “Cortisol” and Cortisol is a very powerful chemical which can alter your immune system, suppress the digestive tract, even impair the growth process and also has negative effects on the reproductive system. There is enough scientific evidence to prove that Cortisol causes an upregulation in tumor formation in the human body. 

Adrenalin also increases under stress and can be very toxic to our systems. Stress affects the brain in a number of ways including memory and learning abilities, cognitive deficits (brain damage, impaired functioning) as well as mood alterations. Our Endocannabinoids and the Cannabinoid receptors are intricately linked to the pathway known as The Cortico-Limbic Circuit of the stress system which regulates the whole stress response. Stress not only blocks the ECS receptors but also stops the production of endocannabinoids like Anandamide and 2-AG. 

The truth is that good health cannot dwell in an unhappy body and this is just one of the reasons why Cannabis is now famous for making humans laugh

We know that Cannabinoids regulate a variety of stress related behaviors at distinct locations in the brain because of the expression of Cannabinoid receptors in these locations. Also we know that the EC system controls the Endocrine system from where the stress hormones are released.

Cannabis has been helping people to relax for thousands of years by reducing stress and relieving tension and anxiety because it protects the brain from the harsh effects of stress and what more could we possibly want from our companion plant? And millions of people use Cannabis for mood elevation and this is exactly why our main Endocannabinoid produced in the human brain is named "Anandamide" the Sanskrit meaning "Bliss". Anandamide is the human version of THC and 2-AG is the human version of CBD. 

Stress can literally eat a person up and this is because it actually causes serious biological damage to individual cells affecting how cells communicate and send and receive messages affecting all of the body’s systems not only the brain even the heart as we know how many people have stress related heart attacks. Stress also causes physical pain and we all know that Cannabis is the best pain killer. Cannabis and especially THC devours stress because it stops the production of the stress hormones. Something else I have noticed is that while there is no doubt that Cannabis can alter behaviour in many people, there is a certain positive regulating role in behaviour during particularly stressful times or in times of environmental challenges. 

Observing people from all walks of life operating under stress with and without Cannabis I can say that Cannabis consumers definitely seem to handle stress better than non- users and this is because of the way plant derived Cannabinoids interact with our stress hormones. People who do not consume Cannabis will have a different perspective to stress because their EC systems are not performing properly having depleted the body of Anandamide, our natural THC to protect them against the stress.  This decline in Anandamide immediately activates the stress response in the body and brain by releasing toxic stress hormones into the blood stream. 

So when stress levels are high Anandamide levels will be low and it is this depletion of our natural THC which is what makes people feel more anxious in times of stress. It is true that the secretion of glucocorticoids is a natural adaptive response which is necessary for any organism to respond appropriately to a stressor but it is also true that ongoing secretion is toxic to our health. Scientists have implicated the EC system in the adaption of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA axis) during repeated exposure to stress because their findings prove that our Endocannabinoids regulate the HPA axis response to stress and this is further proof of the controlling role of Cannabis over our hormonal system. [26]  (Lovallo, 2006) Only through supplementation with plant derived Cannabinoids will people begin to feel better because it is the THC which makes people feel better because THC from the Cannabis plant is the only way to naturally supplement our internal ‘joy molecule’ proving that Cannabis can give us joy as well as perfect health and this is how Cannabis can cure stress.

Cannabis dosing

Things would be a lot easier if there were just one kind of Cannabis plant and doctors would have an easier task of recommending a certain Cannabis dose. But the truth is that there are thousands of different strains some very potent and others which don’t have much effect on the body or mind. Different delivery routes also complicate the matter further because different routes have different effects. Despite all these mysteries surrounding Cannabis medicine dosage can be measured in order to achieve the desired healing effect each patient is looking for. 

At the end of the day dosing is relative to the potency of the THC content of the plant material which all boils down to plant genetics. Dr Donald Abrams MD Professor of Clinical Medicine at the University of California in San Francisco is one of the few medical doctors who have written about Cannabis dosing. He offers final dosing recommendations which I use in my own medicine as a guideline. Plants which tests result in around 10% THC he suggests a daily dose of between .15 to 5.55 grams which is a suitable dose for most illnesses but certain cancers will need a much higher dose. As THC levels increase dosage should decrease in grams. Cannabis testing at 20% THC for example would reduce to a daily dosage of around .08 to 2.79 grams while 30% THC would reduce to .01 to 1.86 grams and so on but the important thing to consider is that dosage is an deeply individual issue and often I will treat two patients with the exact same medical diagnoses with different dosages and this is largely because of individual Cannabinoid receptor expression and individual hormonal absorption rates. It really is true that less is more and I am a huge fan of micro dosing or miniscule dosing in my healing work and especially with Cannabis medicine. Research is now starting to prove that just tiny amounts of Cannabinoids can stimulate the body to make more Endocannabinoids and build more receptors. [27] (admin, 2004)

More receptors increase a person's sensitivity to Cannabinoids; which means that smaller doses have larger effects, and the individual has an improved foundation for optimum EC system activity by consuming just a tiny dose of Cannabis on a regular basis. Some of my oldest patients in their 90’s already are literally consuming six raw Cannabis leaves a day as part of a miniscule maintenance dosing plan. Other patients maintain their health with daily doses Cannabis seeds while others might have established their personal tolerance at say 10 ml of coconut infused Cannabis oil per day. But when it comes to man-made drugs, it can be difficult to control the dose of synthetic medicines and often the patient doesn’t really have a choice but to commit to the medicine at the prescribed dose and endure whatever side effects come their way. It starts becoming obvious that the whole-plant herbal version of Cannabis can offer many positive effects which are not present in synthetic versions. The important thing to bear in mind is that synthetic man-made Cannabis medicines are definitely not as effective as when working with whole herbal plant extracts.  Here is a quote by Dr Ware of Health Canada, he says:

“By virtue of purifying those resins, isolating them, and putting them into pharmaceutical products, you sort of give rise to a more standardized and clean product…the challenge is that even though we have these existing prescription cannabinoids that these prescription medicines don’t seem to work the same way that the herbal product does.” [28] (Admin licencetogrow, 2019)

This is the truth and I really don’t mean to bash the pharmaceutical industry because they do have a lot of excellent products which are also helping many patients but it seems obvious that doctors will have to educate themselves about whole herbal Cannabis healing and not only the synthetics they will be allowed to sell. A lot of the doctors I have worked with have shown enough enthusiasm to learn about this complex and highly evolved plant. They realise that Cannabis medicine doesn’t really fit into any of the conventional medical boxes and so it needs to be handled in its own right, and with individual treatment programs to be fully appreciated by doctor and patient. The reason why the actual plant cures more effectively than synthetics is because of The Entourage Effect.

This is the understanding that all of the plants chemical components must be present in the recipe. All of the different Cannabinoids and terpene profiles, terpenoids and flavinoids together are involved in the healing process and they all have to work together to achieve the magical healing properties we are seeing from whole herbal Cannabis. We must all realize that THC and CBD are only a part of the equation. The concept of the Entourage Effect comes from the Hebrew University in Israel from the laboratory of Professor Raphael Mechoulam and describes how all of the chemical compounds of Cannabis must work together in symphony to create the total of all the plant parts which then transcend to the magic powers of this plant of renown.  [29] (MarzodRaphaelMechoulama, 1998)

The entourage effect is the natural combination of over 140 known Cannabinoids as well as hundreds of other chemical components which together produce the specific natural effects of whole herbal Cannabis. There are even terpenes and terpenoids of which over 200 have already been identified and which also mimic the actions of Cannabinoids and also have their own special healing powers so no-one really knows the true number of chemical components within the Cannabis plant.

Potency as with other medical drugs is not only concerned with how strong the effect of a medicine is but rather at what concentration or dose these effects are achieved in different individuals. For instance THC and CBD have different potencies at different targets because of the different ways in which they interact with our other receptors and of course everyone’s receptors work completely differently. This is important because at higher doses both THC and CBD are able to engage more targets and in this way offer more powerful healings. 

Estimating which doses are needed to engage different targets is the secret to healing with this medicine. The research involving my own recipe The Cannabis Coconut Connection® took 12 years of field study to bring to the public after almost 20 years of growing and researching the human companion plant and research is ongoing in the field of development. Over the years the challenge has always been to try to produce a quasi-standard recipe for the most common ailments like insomnia, nausea, pain, inflammation, menstrual problems, lack of appetite, obesity, constipation, headaches, high blood pressure, depression, and anxiety. 

In general when working with a Cannabis strain which records around 6 to 8% THC and a 1:1 ratio of THC to CBD meaning that the CBD ratio would also be between 6 and 8% an effective formula has proven to be 10 grams of pure and properly cured Cannabis flowers to 100 ml of virgin organic coconut oil to make small amounts of medicine. A 5ml daily dose taken at night cures most day to day complaints but healing will always depend on individual treatment programs.

One of the biggest differences between Cannabis medicine and pharmaceutical drugs is that the pharmaceuticals generally only have high potency at one specific target, meaning a specific receptor which they are engineered to target. Cannabis targets all of our receptors and this is why this medicine works so fast and so effectively for such a wide range of health issues. This is also why Cannabis works so well with other pharmaceutical drugs and this has been a blessing over the years as many doctors were not even aware that their patients were self medicating with Cannabis as part of their treatment. The truth is that Cannabis will never be a medicine which can be standardized and this is because our Cannabis receptor system is as unique to each of us as our fingerprints so factors like receptor expression, tolerance, dual purpose, retrograde transmission and the chakra system also need to be understood. 

This is not only because everyone is different but also because no two Cannabis plants are the same and even on the same plant no two buds or branches contain the exact same chemical makeup. Nothing about the EC system is constant or predictable because it is an ever changing system unlike any other system we have ever studied.

Establishing Cannabinoid tolerance also varies from person to person especially in respect of the main psychoactive compound THC. Scientists are actively studying the mechanisms which underlie the development of this tolerance. And it is interesting to note that the extent to which any one of these mechanisms is involved in the establishment of this tolerance seems to be brain-area based and I really believe that this is because the brain is the main target of THC.

Many medical practitioners and paediatricians and even veterinarians continue to be amazed at the virtually miraculous healing abilities of the Cannabis plant and truly this plant has shown us many miracles which people continue to experience, even long after doctors say there is no hope. A lot of people have seen me at their death bed and then weeks later we are drinking tea together. But for too many others when I get to the death bed the patient is often closer to pearly gates than the door of death. It is never fair to offer false hope and sometimes it is simply too late and I really urge people not to wait until a family member is on their death bed before considering Cannabis medicine. 

Many doctors are wondering if Cannabis medicine will work for their patients but they don’t really know anything about how the medicine works or even if it is a real medicine. Some doctors feel that once Cannabis is legal for everyone there doesn’t seem to be any point in doctors prescribing it. Doctors can expect obvious questions from patients such as “How much to take? When to take it? And what type of effects will be felt?” These are the type of things you should be able to discuss with your doctor or health care provider.

And there will always be a need for whole herbal Cannabis dispensing because not everyone likes gardening and most people are either too busy or too ill to tend plants. So doctors will still need to assist in making this medicine available to their patients where they can be sure that it contains what the label says it contains and hopefully has been tested for toxins and heavy metals.

There are many people producing various Cannabis medicines and often I think there are more producers than patients but the fact is that you really do not know what is in these products and the only way to be totally sure of what you are consuming is to grow the plants yourself and produce your own medication otherwise you will need to put your trust in another human being who really is no more qualified than yourself. Many doctors today are fully aware of the medicinal healing properties of Cannabis and everyone should be urged to discuss this very serious matter with their health care practitioners to find the best solution for their personal medical disorders.

It is quite possible for conventional and natural medical practitioners to work together for the overall healing of the people. We can see how more and more doctors are beginning to realise the truth about Cannabis however they lack the scientific research to adequately administer this medication in its natural form.

Going forward more and more people will need information from their doctors about Cannabis medicine because it is helpful for so many day to day complaints. Doctors must not feel awkward when discussing Cannabis with their patients even though the patient might be far more informed.  It is important to rather focus on the evidence of the healing abilities of the plant and realise that this is a barrier which needs to be broken down for the benefit of everyone especially sick children and their suffering parents.

Most doctors are approachable and are accustomed to discussing alternative treatments. If your doctor is unfamiliar or hesitant to prescribe it you should take it upon yourself to explain the science and medical support for your specific experiences. The best way to approach your doctor is from a position of knowledge and this is exactly how a lot of doctors will learn about Cannabis medicine from their own patients. My limited medical training was most helpful because a traditional healer can be very gifted but at times it does become necessary to confer with doctors on various patients when a medical treatment becomes the more appropriate intervention. Without this training it is not easy to communicate with the medical professionals so healers with training and practice in western medicine automatically bring something extra to their work and can act as a bridge between the traditional world and the medical world.

The biggest difference between doctors and traditional healers is that we are shown through our spiritual connection to the ancestors the exact nature of a patient’s problem. It is different from listening through a stethoscope to find clues to form an opinion although to be honest I have had a love affair with my stethoscope since my early nursing days and many doctors are surprised I even have one. As a traditional healer I really value cooperation with medical professionals and I have tried to cultivate relationships where we each respect one another and many doctors have said that I have wonderful medicine. They want to know more about it and they refer patients to me because I specialise in some areas and they specialise in other areas and we should all refer to each other for our own specialities as we do amongst ourselves as well.

Some diseases are better treated with traditional herbs while others respond best to western medicine. For example western procedures are seen as best for emergency and critical care and most healers will have an ambulance on standby for such cases. Hospitals are able to replace patient’s fluids if they become dehydrated and can offer blood transfusions where necessary. Millions of people especially in Africa have placed their faith in traditional healing for generations, yet they hear about the miracles of modern science. As health care providers we must all try to offer patients the best of both worlds. Not so long ago it was unacceptable for the medical community to work with traditional healers but now we are reaching out to the doctors and visiting their busy clinics. Today we can see that this cooperation will only grow stronger and stronger and have great benefits for patients and their medical staff in western hospitals.

Medical professionals should try to understand the myths, the facts, the fears, the challenges as well as the rewards of working with this medicine in order to become a dependable doctor who can confidently treat patients with Cannabis medicine. They need to understand the different delivery routes of this medicine and why it is so important to choose the appropriate method for each individual patient. Individual personalised treatment is one of the core principals of prescribing Cannabis medicine. 

It is my hope that doctors might see this as an opportunity to provide an excellent healing service to their patients and to actually cure them so we need doctors and patients to have an open mind about Cannabis medicine. Personally I feel that the doctors who will benefit the most are the paediatricians especially when treating epilepsy for instance. No one can say that there is not enough research or evidence to prove that Cannabis is helping thousands of epileptic children and their families to live relatively normal lives.

Acknowledging the sacred relationship between Cannabis and humans is what will determine whether doctors and healers will comprehend the intricate network of the true natural healing powers of the Cannabis plant and its receptors in our bodies. Cannabis healing is so well documented in the ancient texts but in the future I would like to see Cannabis being the first port of call for preventative and curative treatment through the focus on receptor expression and that doctors might begin to accept Cannabis as a very effective medicine rather than a last resort.