COLUMUBS, Ohio – The State Medical Board of Ohio will study medical marijuana’s potential efficacy for a handful of conditions that nine state residents want to add to the list of qualifying conditions.
Over the next several months, the board will consider the following nine petitions. Some of them are repeated because they were submitted more than once by different petitioners.
-Gilbert’s syndrome
-Anxiety
-Degenerative disk disease, chronic pain, post-traumatic stress disorder
-Bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, sleep disorder
-Opioid use disorder
-Insomnia
-Lupus
-Opioid use disorder
-Autism spectrum disorder
The state currently allows medical marijuana for 25 conditions. Two of the conditions that Ohioans requested this year are already permitted: chronic pain and PTSD.
Each year, the State Medical Board considers new conditions. All the petitions are expected to be presented to a medical board committee during a Feb. 9 meeting, when it will determine which petitions warrant further consideration and open a public comment period for them via email.
The board may hire physicians who are experts in the diseases to testify about the benefits and risks of medical marijuana. The board usually makes a decision by late summer on which, if any, conditions to add to the list.
Last year, 30 petitions were submitted. The board determined six warranted further consideration, and ultimately decided to add Huntington’s disease, spasticity and terminal illness to the list.
The board has generally been conservative in adding conditions. Some years it hasn’t added any at all.
Members of the Ohio Medical Cannabis Industry Association submitted four petitions this year, for autism, insomnia, lupus and opioid use disorder. The State Medical Board has reviewed autism each year and rejected it, on the recommendation of physicians at Nationwide Children’s Hospital.
But the petition includes a 2021 article published by Canadian researchers who reviewed a handful of studies looking at cannabis in children and adolescents with autism, and identified children whose conditions significantly improved with marijuana, as well those who had adverse events, including psychotic episodes.
“Ohio’s patients suffering from these chronic and often debilitating conditions deserve the right to legally explore alternative treatment options under the care of their physician,” said Andrew Rayburn, president of the association and CEO of Buckeye Relief.
Meantime, a bipartisan bill in the Ohio House that would add autism spectrum disorder to the list of medical marijuana qualifying conditions is up for a committee vote Tuesday in the Ohio House Health Committee. The bill is sponsored by Reps. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican, and Juanita Brent, a Cleveland Democrat.
Seitz said there are enough votes in committee for House Bill 60 to pass.
“I have every confidence we’ll get it to the floor if it passes out of committee with good support,” Seitz said.