News & Views
ASAM marijuana policy updated
The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) continues to oppose marijuana legalization and recommends that jurisdictions that already have sanctioned the sale of marijuana products prohibit those sales to anyone under age 25, according to its recently updated...
Legal marijuana’s impact on CO troubling
Marijuana-related problems of public health and safety are worsening in Colorado, according to a new federal report released today by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, or HIDTA. The agency is part of a national network of federal offices charged...
Feds ease rules on cannabis research
The White House today announced its intention to lift a bureaucratic requirement identified as an impediment to scientific research of cannabis. The move is consistent with calls from a group of bipartisan lawmakers and from recommendations issued in May by Smart...
CO adult pot use almost double national average
A new statewide study funded by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment found that 13.6 percent of Colorado adults are regular users of marijuana -- almost double the rate (7.4 percent) of the entire United States, according to recent Health and Human...
SAM: Marijuana research overhaul
Smart Approaches to Marijuana, or SAM, today released a new report, "Researching Marijuana's Potential Responsibly: A Six-Point Plan" and called for a series of recommendations aimed at overhauling how marijuana is researched in the United States. The report -- which...
Marijuana no treatment for PTSD
I joined the U.S. Army in 2012 at age 42 largely because I am a psychiatrist who wants our active-duty and veteran service members and their families to receive the mental healthcare they need and deserve. I continue to serve and was deployed to the Middle East in the...
Clearing the Haze: Another look at pot
I am honored to have worked with the editorial board and publisher of The (Colorado Springs) Gazette on a perspective series about marijuana legalization titled "Clearing the Haze." I am a journalist and a native North Carolinian -- the great-granddaughter of tobacco...
NIDA corrects the record
Marijuana-legalization advocates frequently claim the National Institute on Drug Abuse has a monopoly on marijuana research and is biased in the projects it decides to fund. To support the claim, this quote, which first appeared in the New York Times in 2010, is often...
Use and diversion of medical marijuana among adults admitted to inpatient psychiatry
The results of this research were published in the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse in March 2015. For more information, see PubMed.gov Co-authors: Nussbaum AM, Thurstone C, McGarry L, Walker B, Sabel AL Citation: Am J Drug Alcohol Abuse. 2015...
Experts: claims pot safer are bogus
There are few better examples of how science and journalism come together to confuse the public than last week's news coverage of research out of Europe assessing and comparing risks associated with use of several drugs, including alcohol, marijuana and tobacco. The...
Read the book
Clearing the Haze is a guide designed to help parents determine whether their child may have a substance problem and, if so, how to begin to address it. This book includes the voices and insight of experts in substance abuse counseling, young people in recovery, and parents who have lived the nightmare of adolescent addiction.