on how the patient should orally take the drug, the person administering the drug must keep in mind other considerations. First, the drug must be given early enough to prevent anticipatory vomiting. This is a well known phenomenon in cancer patients. That is chemotherapy patients expect to vomit and in anticipation of it, they begin vomiting before the treatment even begins. Another consideration of administering the drug is blood concentration level. The amount of the drug must raise the concentration of the drug in the blood to more than 10.0 ng./ml. On the other hand, it must be at a lower blood concentration level than that which will initiate severe mood alteration. Lastly, it must be given often enough to maintain the concentration level until the threat of vomiting has passed. The second question raised by critics is the age of the patient. In some studies, it was found that people over the age of 60, had such severe mood alterations that they dropped out of the study. This may have been because the amount of the drug taken was too great. Other studies have proved that taking THC with other nausea reducing drugs prove to work with the older patients. Overall, THC in marijuana is accepted by many doctors and scientists to be effective for reducing or stopping vomiting in chemotherapy patients. Another potential medical use of marijuana is to control spasm and spasticity. Spasms and spasticity are usually caused by stroke, cerebral palsy, and multiple sclerosis. It is also caused by spinal cord damage from automobile accidents, athletic injuries, violence, and combat. Spasms affect over one million Americans. Sometimes, muscles can become permanently contracted if the spasms are chronic. As of now, there is no effective surgery or medicine to treat spasms. Neurosurgery does not eliminate spasticity. Drugs for spasms are not that effective and usually have many side effects. For these reasons marijuana should be studied more because...
