Most physicians do not support expanding legalization of cannabis for adult use

Key takeaways:

• People with chronic pain showed more support for four policies expanding cannabis access than physicians.
• Those who used cannabis for chronic pain had the highest levels of support for policies expanding access.

Patients with chronic pain showed greater support for several policies expanding access to cannabis compared with physicians, a research letter in JAMA Network Open showed.

In contrast, more physicians supported policies that further regulated access to medical cannabis.

According to the CDC, 38 states have legalized medical cannabis, whereas 24 states allow cannabis use for nonmedical purposes.

As legalization across the country has continued to progress, so has the use of cannabis. Healio previously reported that the use of medical cannabis rose from 1.2% in 2013-2014 to 2.5% in 2019-2020.

“Given this policy environment, we conducted surveys of physicians and people with chronic pain on support for policies affecting access to cannabis for chronic pain,” Elizabeth M. Stone, PhD, MSPH, an instructor at the Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and colleagues wrote.

The researchers surveyed a total of 1,661 people with chronic back pain and 1,000 physicians.

More people with chronic pain supported federal legalization of medical cannabis (70.8% vs. 59%), federal legalization of cannabis for adult use (54.9% vs 38%), requiring insurance coverage of cannabis for chronic pain treatment (64% vs 50.6%) and requiring states with medical cannabis programs to provide subsidies for people with low income (50.1% vs 30.6%) compared with physicians.

Meanwhile, more physicians supported requiring patient registration with the state medical cannabis program to access medical cannabis (68.1% vs. 49.2%) compared with people with chronic pain.

Stone and colleagues noted that people who used cannabis for chronic pain had the highest levels of support for policies expanding access, whereas physicians who had not recommended cannabis for chronic pain had the lowest levels.

More physicians who had recommended cannabis for people with chronic pain supported physician training on the use of cannabis for chronic pain (74.3% vs. 63.2%) and patient registration with state medical cannabis programs (71.2% vs. 63.7%) vs. those who had not.

Additionally, fewer people who used cannabis for chronic pain supported patient registration requirements (41% vs. 53.5%) compared with those who did not.

There were multiple study limitations, which “include the possibility of sampling bias in the web panels used and self-report biases related to issues with recall or social desirability,” Stone and colleagues wrote.

References:

• State medical cannabis laws. Available at: https://www.cdc.gov/cannabis/about/state-medical-cannabis-laws.html. Accessed Oct. 4, 2024.
• Stone E, et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2024;doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.35843.