Medical Marijuana: All Facts, No Fiction (Video) Segment 8

Phillip Leveque has spent his life as a Combat Infantryman, Physician, Toxicologist and Pharmacologist.

(SALEM, Ore.) - Welcome to the eighth installment of this special series. This is an ongoing question and answer segment that allows our viewership to email questions to Dr. Phil Leveque, and those questions are addressed in future online video segments.

In this segment Dr. Leveque discusses a number of questions relating to the medicinal use of marijuana. Some of the questions addressed in this segment include: What is the effect of he subject of second-hand smoke? What is the relationship between medical marijuana and asthma? And what are the pros and cons about Marinol, the synthetic version of medical marijuana that is created in laboratories?

DO YOU HAVE A QUESTION FOR DR. LEVEQUE? Email: newsroom@salem-news.com or simply write a comment at the bottom of the page. You do not have to use your real name if you are not comfortable doing so. Watch for your question in upcoming segments.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Salem-News.com does not advocate any illegal activity. This special segment is geared completely toward exploring the legal use of marijuana as a medical treatment. Dr. Phillip Leveque's opinions and advice are intended only as such, and his statements are strictly his own, and do not represent the opinions or policies of Salem-News.com.

This is the full transcript from the video. You will see the video screen when you scroll to the bottom of the page.
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Bonnie: In this segment, in our ongoing series with Dr. Phil Leveque on the use of medical marijuana here in the state of Oregon, as well as other toxicology and pharmacology issues that are going on here, what we have done is we've taken some email questions that have come in recently, and we're going to share those with you and get your feedback on those. We'd like to encourage people to please, send them on in, newsroom@salem-news.com, if you would like to email the doctor directly. Ok, here's one that I don't think we've talked about before. One person is writing in and asks, "Is second hand smoke real? And if so, is it dangerous for me to smoke it medicinally around my kids?"

Dr. Leveque: The answer to that is yes. But, the whole thing of it is, the second hand smoke is so low in THC and the other products, that it would have virtually no effect on a person, unless they were in a closed, what you'd call a smoke filled room. Then, with the most sensitive instruments for determining THC and so forth, they would show a slight positive, but as far as the effects on the children or other persons in the room, they would be minimum.

Bonnie: So you don't think they would have side effects that would be obvious. Do you think this is something that comes up often with patients? Have you heard these questions before, about second hand smoke?

Dr. Leveque: Well, this is one of the crazy things about this. That somebody dreamed up the idea that, yes, if you have a medical marijuana card you can smoke marijuana, but you can't do it in the presence of your children. Well now, most people that have medical marijuana permits have children! I guess they're supposed to push them out of the house or something while they use their marijuana medicine. I mean, there are some of the strangest rules and regulations about how to use medical marijuana, they just drive every body crazy. And that's certainly one of them.

Bonnie: That sounds like an example of where a little common sense might do us all a lot of good. Ok, this one writes in that "I'm fifteen years old and my mom is worried that using medical marijuana, even just using it medicinally, will give me brain damage." So, what do you think about that, in a young person using it?

Dr. Leveque: That's way far out. Fact of the matter is, in Israel, they have found that the use of Cannabis medications is medically helpful in stroke. So this business of it causing brain damage is crazy. The thing of it is, that cannabis drugs, marijuana, do have some sedation qualities, but like I said, this is way far out. What is this, a 15-year old boy? It sounds like he's been exposed to the fumes already, and asking a question of that nature proves that it hasn't adversely affected his brain.

Bonnie: Well, that's a good point. I was just thinking that maybe the question was because of memory loss. Memory loss is something that's often named as something that could be a side effect.

Dr. Leveque: One of my patients was a Marine Corps Captain, a helicopter pilot in Vietnam. He was shot down seven times, the last time he was in the hospital 31 months getting put together. When he got out of the hospital, he went to MIT to get his Masters of Business Administration and made a 4.0! So I don't think he was adversely affected by this and he was using marijuana all the time. Apparently he and a bunch of other Marines discovered marijuana in Vietnam, and they found out that it was pretty helpful. Battle stress is something that, you would like to lose the short term memory on battle. So, that was probably a good idea.

Bonnie: Ok, the next one: "Is medical marijuana any good for asthma? I'm told not to smoke, so what would be best for me?"

Dr. Leveque: I have had many patients that have had asthma. They have asthma, they use marijuana for the asthma, and they come in to get a legal permit so they can use it legally. Now, in extremely severe asthma, I'm not sure. But the ones that I saw, say that they use it very effectively.

Bonnie: Is anyone allergic to marijuana? How rare is that, and what are the symptoms if you are actually allergic?

Dr. Leveque: I have heard from people, I've talked to some people who say, "I think I'm getting an allergic reaction to this." But, some people, new users, will get some sort of reaction from this, but I haven't heard of anybody choking which is one of the signs of respiratory allergy, I've heard of nobody getting any hives from it. Apparently there are some people that can't tolerate it, and what is the basis for their lack of toleration, I can't figure out.

Dr. Leveque: Absolutely not. About the worse adverse effect my patients tell me is falling asleep in front of the refrigerator. So that's about as bad as it gets. Although, some people do get high, but euphoria is one of the benefits I would say, from the use of marijuana. What I used to tell people is that marijuana not only makes you feel good, it makes you feel "gooder". And this, to me, is one of the benefits of the use of marijuana. You want to use a medicine to make you feel better. All medicines are supposed to do that. So why is this big negative aspect of marijuana making a person feel better? I don't understand that.

Bonnie: Well I don't know, but I think that the high you're talking about, if some other drugs that are prescribed were considered to make you high, if codeine was talked about as getting high, maybe we wouldn't have the same terminology perhaps.

Dr. Leveque: Codeine, codeine makes you goofy. Whether or not goofy is high, I'm not really sure. But I took an overdose of codeine one time and I was goofy, and I may not have recovered from that, I don't know.

Bonnie: That explains a lot. Okay. Does marinol do the same thing for people as marijuana, and if so, why would people want to use marijuana then?

Dr. Leveque: Well ok, marinol comes in 2.5 milligrams, 5 milligrams, and 10 milligrams. And what I've been told by patients who take marinol, 2.5 doesn't do anything. Five milligrams does do something for some people, and what that is I can't really say. But they say, "10 milligrams knocked me on my butt!" One of the worst thing about marinol, and this is in the medical literature, is that it does cause panic attacks and anxiety, and the effects don't start for about an hour, then after that you're stuck with it for four hours. Who wants to have a panic attack for four hours? With marijuana you can smoke it, or use a vaporizer, and inhale as much as need to reach the desired effect, which is usually not getting high. It's to a state of comfort or relief from your pain, whatever it is. Marijuana, cannabis, is such a versatile drug, it works so well for so many conditions, a user soon finds out what is enough, and there's no way for a doctor or anyone else to tell a person, "just use this much", because there's no such thing as "this much".

Bonnie: Well that actually leads to another thing we want to cover, because someone else asks "how does a doctor supervise the dose of marijuana?"

Dr. Leveque: I have interviewed probably about 5,000 patients and 99% of them have been using marijuana. The longest use, I had two men that had been using for 55 years. I think they know how to use it. The average is about 30 years, and they probably know how to use it too. And because it costs so much, it costs between $300 and $600 an ounce, you can't afford to waste it by getting high. You just can't do that, nobody's got that kind of money.

Bonnie: Well that's certainly something to take into consideration. Now I think we may have gone over this before, but they ask how are diseases or conditions rated when it comes to medical marijuana and getting a permit?

Dr. Leveque: They're all rated the same. If you have one of these 10 or so conditions, you are eligible to get a permit and there's no other strings attached. As far as I know that is the situation in all eleven states that you can get a permit. There's no such restrictions because there can't be, because the cannabinoids, THC etc, rate from 5% to as high as 30%. And you never know when you get an unknown batch what it's going to be, and everyone has to be very careful about how much they use. I've heard of people who think they're pretty macho and somebody tells them "this is pretty strong stuff" and they say "aw heck with that,give me a blast of it" and take a big inhalation and bonk over just like that. They probably wouldn't do that twice.

Bonnie: No probably not. Now, let's see. How does it help migraines? Does it stop them all together?

Dr. Leveque: I doubt that very much. The thing of it is, migraines come all the way from slight to extremely severe. And an extremely severe migraine will knock a person out for 2 or 3 days. Even if they take good medications for it, including marijuana. So, no, it doesn't stop them completely. Though it may in some people.

Bonnie: I'm sure that's the same case with many of these things. This is a treatment, it's not a solution. It's to get them through their day, their week, and to help them not have to take a lot of other narcotics that they may have otherwise had to take. Is that true?

Dr. Leveque: Well, as far as I know, marijuana doesn't cure anything. So you have to continue to use it, like if you are diabetic you have to use insulin. The strange thing about it is, that there's a natural marijuana substance manufactured by your body called an andomide, which we produce all of the time, and THC is just a synthetic plant-produced susbstance which is similiar to the natural stuff which is in our bodies.

Bonnie:Wow. Well, that's something I haven't heard before, and I'm sure that's something most of you haven't heard before as well.

Send in your questions to newsroom@salem-news.com and Dr. Leveque will answer them for you. That is what we are here for.

Dr. Leveque: I have a final word for all the people who use marijuana, don't smoke in the rain. And if you have to ask why not, or why? Then you're smoking too much. Thank you.

WATCH THE COMPLETE VIDEO REPORT BELOW WITH SALEM-NEWS.COM'S BONNIE KING AND DR. PHIL LEVEQUE.
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More information on the history of Leveque can be found in his book, General Patton's Dogface Soldier of Phil Leveque about his experiences in WWII. Order the book by mail by following this link: salem-news.com/pages/Dogface_soldier.

Watch for Dr. Phil Leveque's video question and answer segments about medical marijuana with Bonnie King.

Other articles and video segments about medical marijuana on Salem-News.com:

Salem-News.com Marijuana Coverage

Where and How to Smoke Legal Marijuana without Fear of Arrest in the U.S.

Eulogy of a Great Warrior: Hoss Plourde

The Ripple Effect How Marijuana Laws Are Impacting Society

Audit the Audit

Welcome Home, Tom

Comments Leave a comment on this story.

All comments and messages are approved by people and self promotional links or unacceptable comments are denied.

Ali W. August 12, 2008 10:22 am (Pacific time)

Legalize it!! Great info...

sir smoke alot December 28, 2007 10:42 pm (Pacific time)

a wise man once told me"it is ok to smoke bud,but family comes first"

Henry Ruark September 20, 2007 3:51 pm (Pacific time)

To all: "Drug war" proven one more myth making millions for some in suppression-side, and for others in prisons-industry, both building and operation, while taxpayer drained for dollars much more wisely used in education and healthcare.

S.LMarche; September 19, 2007 6:13 pm (Pacific time)

Legalize It!

Gerry Brandt September 19, 2007 1:41 pm (Pacific time)

This is great information, and the doctor is a real kick. Thank you for sharing this with us, people including myself have a great deal to learn, and the perceived "evils" of this substance seem to me an old wive's tale.

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Medical Marijuana: All Facts, No Fiction (Video) Segment 8

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