Thomas Place, 55, of Rialto, wants more research conducted on the ingestion of marijuana to assist AIDS patients and has helped create an AIDS patient medical marijuana group to further the cause.
"I just want to help other people," Place said, after showing off his concoction of marijuana tincture, a concoction that he says has helped him overcome renal failure. "I've seen people in different clinics struggling."
Place's group, the Inland Empire HIV/AIDS Medical Marijuana Patient Support Group, meets at 7:30 p.m. Mondays in Riverside.
The support group, which is also open to caregivers and family members, has had open discussions on using marijuana for treating AIDS-related symptoms for about a month.
Meetings are for dispensing information such as using marijuana, methods of injection, legal ramifications and sources for obtaining it.
Members, who maintain they are not drug addicts, said AIDS medicines often bring with them side effects that marijuana does not have.
Place said he and group facilitator Lanny Swerdlow would not be allowed to promote using marijuana if the meetings were help in a public-owned facility, which is why the meetings take place at the THCF Medical Clinic & Patient Center.
"The information we're providing them, the AIDS organizations will not provide them," said Swerdlow, also a director of the Marijuana Anti-Prohibition Project, an Inland Empire medical marijuana patient supportgroup and law reform organization.
Rancho Cucamonga Mayor Don Kurth, a physician who is an professor at Loma Linda University Behavioral Medicine Center, is skeptical.
"Speaking as a physician I think there are probably more desirable ways to find relief from symptoms," Kurth said Friday. "But many of the marijuana advocates are very passionate about the symptom relief they get from marijuana in its raw form. So they're often unwilling to try the more medicinally accepted preparations, if you will."
Kurth said that when talking about alleviating symptoms, it's an objective statement.
"If someone says it makes them feel better, it makes them feel better," he said. "It's not something that's easily quantifiable."
Kurth added many but not all physicians are uncomfortable prescribing marijuana and would rather prescribe other medications more specific toward an individual symptom.
Members of the medical marijuana group, like San Bernardino resident Henry Ceslewski, 48, said he enjoyed the "non-traditional ways" of the meetings.
"It's affirmation I have helped healed myself," Ceslewski said, who has stage 3 AIDS.
He is also an amputee, has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and is bi-polar.
"It's got me better under control without being reliant on medications," he said of using marijuana, which he still smokes every day besides injesting it.
Cynthia Moya, 52, of Moreno Valley, was diagnosed in 1994 with HIV. She received a tainted blood transfusion following a seizure in a mall after hitting her head on a glass display.
Her condition later went to full-blown AIDS, and she is also battling ovarian and cervical cancer.
Moya maintains that she has felt better since starting to consume "marijuana treats" with hemp seed oil in the butter besides injesting the cannabis.
Paul Chabot, co-founder of the Inland Valley Drug Free Coalition, said he was skeptical of the group and its purpose.
"It's nothing more than a ploy by a pro-drug group. They're standing back and rallying for their cause."
Chabot said there were many great medications, which have improved over decades, that could be used for people with AIDS and other ailments.
Calvina Fay, executive director of the Drug Free America Foundation, said "essentially marijuana is marijuana. There are different ways to deliver it. But no matter how it's delivered, and this is of particular concern for those with AIDS, there is a good deal of research to support its suppression of the immune system."
Place, discounting critics, said his group has an eye toward the future with hopes it could create community gardens with fruits and vegetables injected with his "liquid marijuana" as well as other projects like salad dressings.
FYI
Inland Empire HIV/AIDS Medical Marijuana Patient Support Group
What: An open discussion on using marijuana for treating AIDS-related symptoms that includes talk on legal, health and access issues.
When: Mondays 7:30 p.m.
Where: THCF Medical Clinic & Patient Center, 647 Main St., #1B, Riverside.
Information: 951-782-9898
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: DailyBulletin.com
Author: Wes Woods II
Copyright: 2010 Los Angeles Newspaper group
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
"I just want to help other people," Place said, after showing off his concoction of marijuana tincture, a concoction that he says has helped him overcome renal failure. "I've seen people in different clinics struggling."
Place's group, the Inland Empire HIV/AIDS Medical Marijuana Patient Support Group, meets at 7:30 p.m. Mondays in Riverside.
The support group, which is also open to caregivers and family members, has had open discussions on using marijuana for treating AIDS-related symptoms for about a month.
Meetings are for dispensing information such as using marijuana, methods of injection, legal ramifications and sources for obtaining it.
Members, who maintain they are not drug addicts, said AIDS medicines often bring with them side effects that marijuana does not have.
Place said he and group facilitator Lanny Swerdlow would not be allowed to promote using marijuana if the meetings were help in a public-owned facility, which is why the meetings take place at the THCF Medical Clinic & Patient Center.
"The information we're providing them, the AIDS organizations will not provide them," said Swerdlow, also a director of the Marijuana Anti-Prohibition Project, an Inland Empire medical marijuana patient supportgroup and law reform organization.
Rancho Cucamonga Mayor Don Kurth, a physician who is an professor at Loma Linda University Behavioral Medicine Center, is skeptical.
"Speaking as a physician I think there are probably more desirable ways to find relief from symptoms," Kurth said Friday. "But many of the marijuana advocates are very passionate about the symptom relief they get from marijuana in its raw form. So they're often unwilling to try the more medicinally accepted preparations, if you will."
Kurth said that when talking about alleviating symptoms, it's an objective statement.
"If someone says it makes them feel better, it makes them feel better," he said. "It's not something that's easily quantifiable."
Kurth added many but not all physicians are uncomfortable prescribing marijuana and would rather prescribe other medications more specific toward an individual symptom.
Members of the medical marijuana group, like San Bernardino resident Henry Ceslewski, 48, said he enjoyed the "non-traditional ways" of the meetings.
"It's affirmation I have helped healed myself," Ceslewski said, who has stage 3 AIDS.
He is also an amputee, has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and is bi-polar.
"It's got me better under control without being reliant on medications," he said of using marijuana, which he still smokes every day besides injesting it.
Cynthia Moya, 52, of Moreno Valley, was diagnosed in 1994 with HIV. She received a tainted blood transfusion following a seizure in a mall after hitting her head on a glass display.
Her condition later went to full-blown AIDS, and she is also battling ovarian and cervical cancer.
Moya maintains that she has felt better since starting to consume "marijuana treats" with hemp seed oil in the butter besides injesting the cannabis.
Paul Chabot, co-founder of the Inland Valley Drug Free Coalition, said he was skeptical of the group and its purpose.
"It's nothing more than a ploy by a pro-drug group. They're standing back and rallying for their cause."
Chabot said there were many great medications, which have improved over decades, that could be used for people with AIDS and other ailments.
Calvina Fay, executive director of the Drug Free America Foundation, said "essentially marijuana is marijuana. There are different ways to deliver it. But no matter how it's delivered, and this is of particular concern for those with AIDS, there is a good deal of research to support its suppression of the immune system."
Place, discounting critics, said his group has an eye toward the future with hopes it could create community gardens with fruits and vegetables injected with his "liquid marijuana" as well as other projects like salad dressings.
FYI
Inland Empire HIV/AIDS Medical Marijuana Patient Support Group
What: An open discussion on using marijuana for treating AIDS-related symptoms that includes talk on legal, health and access issues.
When: Mondays 7:30 p.m.
Where: THCF Medical Clinic & Patient Center, 647 Main St., #1B, Riverside.
Information: 951-782-9898
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: DailyBulletin.com
Author: Wes Woods II
Copyright: 2010 Los Angeles Newspaper group
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
