Medical Value & Use - Marinol v. Medical Marijuana

[Smokin Moose]

Thanks Pinch. What got me going was reading a chapter in Rosenthal's new book where he explores the impact of the essential aromas on the quality of the therapeutic effect.. To me it seems when they are making Marinol they overlook all the important factors that would make Marinol a great medicine. I just wish the two could co-exist.

 

[CounselorH]

OK, some people wouldn't use marijuana, if their lives depended upon it. According to our FDA, Marinol is an accepted alternative. One assumption.

See below, my last post from yesterday...thought I had answered that...








Mr. Moose, I believe people are (or were) comparing the therapeutic effects of the two medicines, thus apples and apples. You cannot compare prices because there is no R&D nor sales cost related to marijuana...thus, we have apples and oranges.

Or as you mentioned: "Marinol is a synthetic copy of THC, not a copy of marijuana." Again, apples and oranges.3:




Howard- It's GW Pharmaceuticals...there you go.

Thank You Mr. Pinch, I could always count on you for setting me right!!

 

[Matanuska Valley]

Marinol sucks it cost me $750.00 for 90 pills 30 days script and it is not haft as good as real Cannabis.
I have had no side effects from the Marinol...

 

[CounselorH]

Marinol sucks it cost me $750.00 for 90 pills 30 days script and it is not haft as good as real Cannabis.
I have had no side effects from the Marinol...

Why are you paying 750.00$ for a drug you don't like.
I was getting 120 for free from Med-Cal, until the price went up
to 1500.00 for 60, 10 mg. Then Medi-Cal & my Issurance stopped
allowing me to have them. I have to say, When I was getting them
for free, I had no complaints, 3 or 4 worked well for exactly 4 hours.

 

[Matanuska Valley]

because thats what it cost here and the court took my MMJ card and told me not to use Marijuana at all...!

 

[evanescence]

I was thinking the same thing!

I don't understand. How can Marinol be used as a treatment of nausea and vomiting if a side effect is nausea and vomiting?

 

[Boss]

I had to say undecided because I have never had marinol. At $1500 for 60 and 4-8 pills a day, there is no ...fucking... way.

 

[Matanuska Valley]

Marinol is bullshit for what they get 4 it. The FED are trying to get in to the Cannabis business you just don't know it yet put both of them side by side, Medical Marijuana wins hand down and it's alot less $$$$ then Marinol...

 

[biggreenbuds4]

iv had marinol before i bout 100 of them for 40 bucks from a friend

well they deff fuck you up but i took like 5 of them at the same time it felt like i ate a bunch of brownies

 

[Biscanna]

For me, prescription Marinol tends to cause a drowsiness that isn't present with raw cannabis. The body metabolizes THC differently, depending on the route of administration (inhalation vs. eating).

IMO, raw cannabis is FAR superior to Marinol in addressing inflammation, pain and nausea.

Here's a really good paper on the idea:
https://cannabis-science.com/papers/cannabis terpenes.pdf

Raw cannabis is poly-pharmaceutical cannabis. Many cannabinoids are indeed terpenes, but many of the other simpler terpenes, commonly found in various flowers, likely contribute medicinal and analgesic properties for the medical patient. It is very likely that many of the other major and minor cannabinoids exhibit medicinal value. It would be surprising if they were all inactive. After all, pharmaceutical companies often create several new drugs (analogs) based on a single base-structure. They start with a drug molecule that works, then they create several variations (analogs) that are only slightly different, but the variation usually has some super and specific new action about it. Well, plants generate their own analogs and until removed, you consume the plant you get dosed with the whole spectrum of analogs instead of a single compound, as with most pills.

Think of any drug or perfume plant. Consider that not only does the drug of interest get made by the plant, but usually several variations, pre-cursors and by-products of that main compound also exist in the plant. Some may be active, some may not. Many times WHOLE plants offer therapeutic benefit vs. isolated extracts. I believe that man's nervous system evolved around facts like this that exist in nature. Our bodies are better equipped to handle these innate chemical variations that each and every generation has encountered in nature...it is what our bodies used and dealt with until the pharmaceutical industry eliminated nature and made treatment sterile and convenient, once a day..

(Off Topic: It's a whole different screed, but the pharmaceutical industry is causing mankind to stray farther from his evolutionary abilities (think stupid-long life expectancies and living the last 40 years of your 105 year life as a disabled and senile loon that can still get a boner - at some point keeping people alive and overcoming ever-worsening diseases leads to a very frail society that crumbles without ongoing pharmaceutical advancement/support.)

 

[Biscanna]

And what makes it so expensive?? I dont get it? Why did they need to make synthetic thc?

"""And what makes it so expensive?? I dont get it? Why did they need to make synthetic thc?""" - OG Kushta
______________________________________________________________________________________
In the U.S. mostly government agencies like National Institute of Health (NIH) receive grants and other funding from the feds, as do some university research programs. But most pharmaceutical companies, especially the bigger ones called "Big Pharma" (Pfizer, Roche), they don't get substantial taxpayer funding. Most companies get bank loans, sell products, sell stock and recruit private investors. There is plenty of lobbying for legislation that is favorable to corporations but that's a different beast.

Now, the FDA regulates (controls) the pharmaceutical industry and they are 100% government. Every research company wanting to make drugs has to do it their way. And because so many Americans are such safety fanatics with narrow comfort ranges, they insist that their drugs be made of highest purity, highest-potency, oral-administration preferred, super-tangerine-flake-streamlined-convenient delivery, once-a-day,no-side-effects.... Sooo, the FDA makes anybody doing research be extra extra diligent. Otherwise, every now and then you get lead in your toothpaste, or fake Prozac.

Well, to do such a good job the companies have to be big, which means they have to pay a bunch of scientists to try to make new drugs from only a crazy idea based on what a shaman said 70 years ago, but those people have to be managed, so they pay for a bunch of managers, and then they need a big ass building for all those people, and then they have to hire lawyers, and people to count the money, and clean the restroom, and maintain all of the computers with the research info, and buy glassware, and all the employees want raises and vacations and insurance since they aren't entitled to reasonably priced healthcare...

...Then the cost of gas goes up, so the cost of ether and chloroform goes up and research chemicals come from petroleum. Then the pharma company has to pay for inspections & permits, DEA licenses and team-building lunches, pay extra to dispose of toxic waste, pay lawsuits for people they killed while testing, pay for Joe-Bobs back surgery, pay for the lobbyists to play golf in Virginia, pay for management to fly to New York every week for a 3 hour meeting...

Finally the pharmaceutical company has what they think is a drug that might work because 42 mice pepped-up all of a sudden and ran on the big metal wheel for an extra few minutes. FDA says they have to test new drugs in animals for up to several years, then they have to test in sick people for a while, then healthy people for a while, then some more people again. After several years of giving out those $10,000 bonuses to every employee each year, and 6-figure bonuses to the executives, and paying all those hospitals and doctors to find the patients to volunteer to test the drug on, they've spent a billion dollars to bring the drug to market and jump through FDA's hoops.

Then assume that only 150,000 people need the drug AND the company wants to make a profit. In the end you pay $15 for a tab, twice daily, for marginally effective Marinol, or you can take your medical card down to the dispensary and pickup enough pharmacologically superior cannabis to last several days...or you can grow your own right next to the chilies and tomatoes. Either way, it appears that cannabis supports local economies.
_____________________________________________________________________________________

Why did they make synthetic THC? Partially because it comes back to the idea that the public demands highly pure pills - magic bullets. Everyone seemed to agree that THC was the primary compound responsible for the high and some of the medicinal benefits. Early lab studies indicated that THC had therapeutic potential but there wasn't as much effort put into isolating, investigating and researching the the other cannabinoids and the synergies reported by users of poly-pharmaceutical (raw) cannabis. We were ignored again.

The schedule I status of cannabis meant that to do research, researchers had to apply to the DEA before they could do their thing. Mysteriously, the DEA was always losing those applications, saying they never arrived, or "Just saying NO" to research and education. It is rather convenient to prevent research on something that has already been deemed of no medicinal use, and happens to be illegal; the serpent that eats it's tail - Ouroboros. Momentum is hard to change.

And it seems the feds were on board. Once they heard that THC had some positive attributes, it seems reasonable that they would think that having "safe synthetic marijuana" would satisfy the public demand for medical marijuana, and further eliminate the chances of recreational cannabis legalization. Likewise, this was an opportunity for a pharmaceutical company to monopolize a brand new market and have their trademarked, patented formulation escorted into legality, Schedule III. In the end, I believe that getting this THC-sesame oil into Schedule III will have played a significant role in the decriminalization movement.

Marinol works against legalization/decriminalization of cannabis. Everyone that takes it recreationally is creating additional demand for it, additional revenue, and that will be misunderstood as effectiveness. Popularity and high-volume sales of Marinol may indicate to lawmakers/drugmakers that Marinol is sufficient and effective, thus no need to legalize cannabis. Besides, why pay more for a tasteless, more expensive, less-environmentally-friendly, inferior buzz?

We must keep up the pressure, keep letting doctors and lawmakers know that raw, vaporized cannabis is superior to oral, single-component Marinol. It's important that they get the vaporization part - smoking is a potentially outdated argument. Jesus that's a bunch of words. Sorry to ramble.

 

[Biscanna]

MARINOL is THC in sesame oil. Nothing more. Oral THC has different pharmacology than inhaled - different metabolism means different effects. Comparing oral Marinol with inhaled cannabis is not a direct comparison, but measures responses between two entirely different systems - not apples to apples at all.

Herb Fellow: All drugs labels require that ANY side effects reported by people must be announced. EVERY drug & placebo tested in the world has a few people that report oddball effects. Give a man sugar pills and he will report a headache, muscle spasms and dizziness.

People are different and respond differently to various drugs. Some people vomit when they first smoke cannabis - the result is usually from the anxiety of consuming the drug and social fears, not from the drug itself, but it has to be reported says the FDA.

Several times through flu and food poisoning cannabis has been the #1 treatment to HELP with nausea. With food poisoning the nausea was suppressed MORE than with prescription nausea meds, but it did not ELIMINATE nausea, cannabis only reduced it. There was still vomiting, but much less violent and less debilitating. Either way, cannabis is far superior for nausea.

 

[moslowjj]

Your close , But it is a synthetic form of THC which is considerably different.
And is garbage as far as I'm concerned. I have not heard 1 person I know that has had a perscription or just taken Marinol ever want to take it again. Way to many side effects..Takes to long to kick in and when it does its nothing like ingesting cannabis in anyway. And why would you need to synthisize a natural herb that has so many uses and very minimal side effects. Plus my perscription was $1600.00 a month takeing 2 pills a day and I tried it for over a month and the side effects just got worse..Sleeplessness, vomiting weird dreams (bad) Mabe for some people but I don't know why.
Our Goverment says there is no medical value in maijuana!!! If so why have they spent millions or billions trying to synthisize it and are still trying.
If an apple cured cancer and they synthiszed a pill would you eat the apple or would you buy the man made pill??? The apple is 50 cents and the pill is 15.00. The apple gives you almost instant releif and the pill takes 45 min to an hour. P.S our gov. also owns the patent on marijuana for use for an array of illness's Go figure..

 

[Profit]

From everything I just read here it sounds like Marijuana is all around better option for the patients in this situation, but I am always amazed with how medicine is always advancing.

 

[talkof401]

Good read, great chart.
And I would rather smoke marijuana anyday.

 

[willie420]

For anyone who doesn't have access to the real stuff and might be interested in trying marinol, there is a generic version available now and i think most insurance companies will pay for it.

 

[powerpop]

I prefer smoking marijuana; I've tried marinol and it didn't give me the pleasant feeling I get from smoking. I love having so many strains to choose from, and it really helps me with my health issues!

 

[Propa Gator]

Ain't nothin like the real thing, baby!
Welcome to 420Magazine, Pop.

 

[Dirt Farmer]

IMHO One of the greatest things about MMJ is that, legal or not, people can produce their own meds without having to pay exorbitant prices to some company thats primary goal is profit...