HER PRESCRIPTION: MARIJUANA

Barbara Douglass has multiple sclerosis, and she has FDA approval to
smoke the joints that relieve her symptoms.

Barbara Douglass is not a depressed pothead.

In two hours, she can perform the following: provide a concise
chronology of her crippling disease; analyze a Grateful Dead album
cover; explain the collectibles in her lakeside home; put on a Stones
record; serve Cokes; display the raw speed of her motorized scooter by
racing around the dining room table while whooping and hollering;
smoke three joints.

Some would say she is high.

That wouldn't describe the whole picture. The Storm Lake woman is one
of eight legal users of marijuana in the United States whose
prescriptions have been approved by the FDA. She uses it to stop the
sudden spasms of her multiple sclerosis. She uses it to get the
munchies and add weight to a body that dipped to 85 pounds. She smokes
at least 10 joints a day.

"I'm alive due to marijuana," she said.

Geared to Educate

Douglass will be one of three patients, in addition to researchers and
medical professionals, featured at The First National Clinical
Conference on Cannabis Therapeutics at the University of Iowa starting
Friday. Organizers say it's geared to educate health care
professionals about the latest research on its medical use.

The mere mention of medical marijuana produces strong reactions,
disputed research and questioned motives. Douglass, 43, knows this.
She has told her story before numerous groups, held up protest signs
at rallies and called on legislators to make its medical use legal.
Call anyone in the country closely related to the subject, and they
know her name.

She is the daughter of a successful retired Storm Lake businessman,
Gilbert Douglass, who watched his daughter gain business savvy, help
expand his main street men's clothing store and inject her own spunk
and high spirits into it before the devastating MS diagnosis.

His daughter was going to take the business over someday.

Tried to Hide Disease

First, she had trouble seeing. Then her legs ached.

By 1988, Mayo Clinic doctors had told her the news.

"They said, 'Hey, Barb, little by little, you can't see, you can't
walk, you'll fall over.' The gig was up," she said.

She denied it, tried to hide the disease that is marked by jerking
muscle tremors and partial paralysis, loss of vision and pain.

Her father noticed her legs were black and blue from
falling.

"One day I came to visit her and she said, 'Daddy, I've got to go to
the bathroom.' She drops to her knees and crawls to the bathroom,"
Gilbert Douglass said.

She was losing sight and could only see shadows and outlines. She gave
up designs about running the store, which eventually closed when her
father retired.

By 1990, Barbara Douglass read about the potential benefits of smoking
marijuana to ease the jerking leg movements and pain. A U.S. Food and
Drug Administration program allowed some patients marijuana
prescriptions during a short time period in the 1990s before
enrollment ended.

"I always thought of those people as undesirables," she said. "The pot
smokers were the bad eggs."

No ex-hippie, her tremors lessened when she began to smoke the
marijuana. She claims her sight has improved. She has gained more than
10 pounds. Her father, 82, calls it a miracle. Barbara insists it has
saved her life.

"The side effect is sleep," she said. "Sleep is good for
you."

Another side effect is euphoria, a reason it is the most widely used
illicit drug in America.

Douglass puts down her joint and goes to a shelf for a tin bucket full
of crumpled dollar bills. She opens the lid and dumps it over her
head, laughing.

"Daddy always said people spend their lives busting their a-- for the
almighty dollar," she said, the bills scattered all over. "The message
is have some fun."

Supporters of medical marijuana say it is the most studied drug in
history and the benefits outweigh the costs. Those against it say it's
a step toward legalization, and there is no proof it works. Many
researchers say more study is needed, although some medical benefit is
likely.

"It's just politics," said Melanie Dreher, dean of the College of
Nursing at the University of Iowa, a sponsor of the conference along
with the College of Medicine. "Every culture has to say that a
substance is bad."

Dreher studied marijuana use in Jamaica. She even saw mothers mix it
in liquids for teething babies.

"Marijuana is an amazing substance," she said, "but its use is so
taboo, people are reluctant to even come to these conferences."

No new research will be presented this weekend. Last year's report by
the Institute of Medicine on medical marijuana will be widely
discussed. When it was issued, both sides used it to support their
theories.

"What we said, in the end, was it was lousy medicine," said Janet Joy,
the institute's study director in Washington, D.C. "We expect more
precision in our medicine today, with fewer side effects. We just
don't smoke our medicine."

"But we did say that if other treatments aren't working and it's a
chronic issue, we advocate letting people use it when it contributes
to the greater good."

The study showed that the greatest benefits may come to AIDS patients
to control nausea and increase appetite, while its use for MS and
glaucoma needs more study. Many cancer patients, health care
professionals say, use the drug illegally to control their nausea from
chemotherapy.

"I have several friends who went through chemo, and they don't know
how they would have made it without it," said Sen. Elaine Szymoniak,
D-Des Moines, who introduced a bill in the Iowa Legislature to
legalize its use for medical reasons. The bill died.

Even though some states have passed similar legislation, federal law
still prohibits its prescription, said Steve Gleason, director of the
Iowa Department of Public Health and a specialist in addiction medicine.

"I can't see myself supporting smoked marijuana," he said. "There just
hasn't been enough hard science to support it."

In addition, it's difficult for the government to endorse a drug that
it fights hard to erase from the culture. Gleason said it is a
"gateway" to harder drug use, although the Institute of Medicine study
said it is not.

Douglass takes a short, unsteady walk to her 10-meter indoor pool,
about as far as she can go without the motorized scooter. Along one
wall of the pool room where she swims to help her symptoms, is a
pyramid of stacked metal cannisters that held 300 marijuana cigarettes
each, her monthly prescription.

She picks up the shipment from her doctor and medicates herself as
needed.

"I'm ruling it," she said. "It's a good scene. You know just when to
take a little puff. You learn to anticipate the spasms."

She can't drive, so the single woman spends her days at home, swimming
or driving her scooter out to the pier with her two dogs. She hears
ducks far away. She loves the cool lake air.

"I'm not out to cop a high or get a buzz or blow away the week," she
said. "I'm alive due to the marijuana. It has given me a reason to
carry on."

All eight of the legal users have visited her home, including fellow
Iowan George McMahon of Bode, who uses it to control muscle spasms
from a rare genetic defect.

"What we are talking about is people who are dying and unbelievably
sick. What happens is, when they use this plant, they are no longer
sick," said Al Byrne, cofounder of Patients Out of Time, a national
non-profit group advocating medical marijuana.

Byrne blames political pressures and pharmaceutical companies, who
resist a medicine anyone can grow, for stopping its medical
legalization. Douglass is a perfect example of what it can do, he said.

Late in the afternoon, she is in high spirits and opens the throttle
on her scooter, doing hairpin curves around the table, her hair even
flying a bit.

"I'm a happy little camper," she said, coming past. "I can spend all
day doing this. And they can't stop me."

Reporter Mike Kilen can be reached at (515) 284-8361 or
ki1enm@news.dmreg.com