Dr Lucido's Survey:

Dr. Lucido's survey of 24 respondents of the 30 of the higher profile
medical-cannabis physicians:

Initial Survey Results

A physician’s approval to use cannabis should be appropriate, credible,
and ultimately, a protective vest, not a "fig leaf."

Purpose: to help patients and patient advocates, caregivers, attorneys,
doctors, etc. differentiate between the wide variance in medical-legal
protection offered by the many medical cannabis physician consultants
now in practice,

• many of whom have excellent EXPERIENCE, ETHICS and practice STANDARDS an offer superior MEDICAL-LEGAL PROTECTION;
• but some of whom offer a MINIMALIST "fig-leaf", cursory, quick-in, quick-out "encounter", and are more likely to be an embarrassment
  should they need to defend a patient to law enforcement.

I HAVE SURVEYED THE PRACTICE STANDARDS OF ABOUT 2 DOZEN of the more visible medical cannabis physicians, and find:

the MAJORITY to be knowledgeable, ethical, and credible. (Remember:
according to California NORML, over 1500 doctors in California have
written at least one recommendation.) Unfortunately, as in any field,
whether medicine, politics, business, journalism, there are a few "LOW
STANDARDS" practitioners. (As I have pointed out before, cannabis is so safe and effective that even the lowest standard doctor I have heard of
has not harmed a patient, and probably never will.) In spite of that,
due to the irrational drug war, we will still have inappropriate
actions by law enforcement, necessitating patients, caregivers, and
physicians to be MORE careful, and MORE thoughtful to patient
medical-legal protection, rather then LESS.

Findings of my initial survey

I found a VERY wide range of services, fees, and other qualities.
Qualities include: ethics, credibility, and time and effort taken by
the medical consultant to establish medical-legal protection.

Range of standards:

Time spent with patient:

--from 3-15 minutes "fig-leaf", assembly line, minimalist standards
--to those who schedule 45-60 minutes for a first appointment, and 30
minutes for yearly follow-up.

Fees:

$100-250 (Ironically, the worst and most embarrassing minimalist work
was done by those who charged $100, AND by those who charged $250!So cost didn't seem to be the best test of protection. (my sound bite for
this level of garbage is "A $50 value for only $100-250!".) Avoid it as
all costs, especially if you are a legitimate patient, and/or growing
your own medicine for yourself or another patients)

• Pre-requirements of "documentation of diagnosis":
• from None

to Yearly follow-up by your own doctor to establish a defensible, credible, record of documentation should you be challenged by inappropriate or overzelous law enforcement. Remember, not only is this consultation about your PHYSICAL HEALTH, but also about your
MEDICAL-LEGAL HEALTH; that is, legal documentation that shows you havea legitimate illness should you be challenged by law enforcement.

Ethics in advertising, and increasing "business":

The worst cases of this involve doctors working out of dispensaries. A
major "no-no" that loses for physicians, and their employees, and their
patients, the full protection of Conant v. Walters. The next worst are
the doctors who "no longer do this", pretending they don't, but still
have a cross-referring of patients. There is a reason that this is even
illegal when one does it with a "legitimate" pharmacy, such as
Walgreen's or Long's.

I encourage legitimate patients to consult with reputable doctors with
good standards, and to avoid the rash of low standards "clinics" that
have opened up next to many dispensaries.


EMAIL ME for further information at:
[email protected] for any further questions about standards. I am
also soliciting patient reports of any adverse experiences with their
medical cannabis consultant, or with law enforcement.

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