STATE COMMISSION EXPANDS MEDICAL USES OF MARIJUANA

The state's medical commission has added diseases that cause severe
gastrointestinal symptoms, seizures or muscle spasms to the list of
"terminal or debilitating medical conditions" for which marijuana may
legally be used under a state law passed by voters in 1998.

The action by the Medical Quality Assurance Commission added to the list
diseases whose symptoms include nausea, vomiting, severe weight loss,
cramping or appetite loss, when they are unrelieved by standard treatments
or medications.

The commission declined to add insomnia and post-traumatic stress disorder,
which were requested in a petition filed in January by Dr. Rob Killian, a
medical-marijuana advocate and sponsor of the initiative that created the
law. But Killian said he was pleased by the commission's action.

"They've done more than any other state in the country in listening to
patients' needs and allowing truly suffering people to have access to
marijuana," he said.

The board recently approved the use of marijuana for Crohn's disease,
another gastrointestinal disease, and for hepatitis C when the symptoms are
debilitating and unrelieved by standard treatments and medications.

Oregon's Health Division recently added agitation from Alzheimer's disease
to the list of medical conditions covered under that state's Medical
Marijuana Act. Alzheimer's is not covered under the Washington law.