MEDICAL POT HAZY ISSUE FOR DOCTORS

Cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, arthritis, migraine headaches.

The list goes on.

When it comes to these and other ailments, some sufferers say marijuana
provides welcome relief from pain, nausea, loss of appetite and other
associated symptoms.

Whether such claims might ultimately lead to increased or widespread
acceptance of the drug for medicinal purposes remains to be seen, however.

Public policy-makers and law enforcement officials continue to wade through
the much-discussed and muddy legal waters generated by a recent spate of
community and state initiatives to decriminalize marijuana for medical use
in California and other states.

Health authorities face a similar challenge: Confirming the drug's actual
medical benefits or drawbacks. It's a topic sure to garner more attention
in Santa Barbara during coming weeks.

Last week, the City Council took a small step toward sanctioning the legal
sale of marijuana for medical purposes, with a majority of councilmembers
saying it was time to try to help patients buy the drug without fear of
prosecution.

In the wake of that decision, a three-member council committee is
considering whether to permit local marijuana clubs to operate without
disruption in conjunction with the voter approved Proposition 215, the 1996
California ballot initiative to legalize medicinal use of the substance.

Despite popular support for medicinal marijuana, discussion persists about
the drug's reliability. Are its purported medical advantages understated or
exaggerated?

Perspectives among health experts vary.

Some doctors hail the drug, while others support it mildly. Still other
physicians disapprove of legalization.

Furthermore, a lack of extensive, recent and numerous studies on medical
marijuana has frustrated both supporters and opponents.

Ask for a source of information on the science behind medicinal cannabis,
and more often than not the most recent study recommended is an
investigation conducted by researchers at the Institute of Medicine. The
report was commissioned by the White House Office of National Drug Control
Policy and released last year.

The project's authors found potential for marijuana in treating some
patients who do not respond well to standard medications, but also warned
that the drug's future as a long-term treatment should not involve
inhalation of pot smoke, which is known to contain harmful carcinogens.

"We found that cannabinoids (psychoactive marijuana particles) appear to
hold potential for treating pain, chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting
and the poor appetite and wasting caused by AIDS or advanced cancer,"
announced report co-author John Benson last year at a news conference about
the study.

"For other conditions, the data are not encouraging," Benson said. "We did
not find compelling evidence that marijuana should be used to treat
glaucoma. And with the exception of painful muscle spasticity associated
with multiple sclerosis, there is little evidence of the drug's potential
for treating migraines or movement disorders like Parkinson's disease or
Huntington's disease .E.E. Most often, the appropriate studies have not
been done."

Dr. Fred Kass, a Santa Barbara cancer expert, supports use of marijuana for
those patients who find benefit. At the same time, he's never prescribed
pot and only rarely writes prescriptions for the FDA-approved drug Marinol,
a manufactured version of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the primary
psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.

Marijuana doesn't come up all that often among his cancer patients who
suffer from nausea or other symptoms that can result from cancer or its
treatments, said Kass, who more often relies on standard pharmaceuticals.

"I think, for most doctors, it's not an integral part of their practice,"
Kass said. "No patient has come in to me and said, 'I need marijuana. you
need to help me get it.'"

The oncologist said AIDS patients, however, stand to benefit more. "That's
the group in which it's been a potentially much more important drug," he said.

City Council member Dr. Dan Secord voted against further consideration of
the medical marijuana question, along with Councilmen Gregg Hart and Rusty
Fairly.

As a doctor, Secord acknowledged that some patients may find cannabis helpful.

Appetite stimulation among severely ill patients may be appropriate in some
cases, he said. For other uses, and overall, Secord is not convinced, however.

"I am concerned about the use of these drugs for marginal illnesses," such
as migraines, Secord said.

He also expressed concern that support for medicinal marijuana will lead to
increased drug abuse.

In addition, "there may be some science, but nobody seems to be sure what
it is," Secord said.

Dr. David Bearman, a Santa Barbara general practitioner, noted that humans
have relied on marijuana for centuries to treat illness.

"It provides mostly symptomatic relief," Bearman said. "There's no doubt
that when you talk to people who use cannabis, they benefit substantially."

Bearman advises local resident David Pryor, who recently organized the
nonprofit Compassionate Cannabis Center to distribute marijuana along the
South Coast. On Tuesday, Pryor lamented a lack of extensive and recent
U.S.-based research supporting medical marijuana applications, and said the
nonprofit organization he leads will further supply area doctors with
reliable information on medicinal benefits.

The doctors, "they're in the blind," said Pryor, who inhales vaporized,
smokeless marijuana to ease the pain of high blood pressure, arthritis and
other ailments.

Physicians, "they really have nothing to go on but their patients."

The cannabis center, which has lobbied the City Council, currently
distributes marijuana to those who qualify, Pryor said.

To hand a bundle of the drug to a suffering AIDS patient, "you've saved
their life, and made their life better," Pryor said. "I have never felt so
good about something."