Research agenda for medical cannabis in palliative care

Abstract

The clinician-patient divide may in part be explained by the disruptive journey MC has taken into the clinical armamentarium. Most medications are conceived in the laboratory or discovered in nature without any strong prior expectations. As such, they are unencumbered by emotional baggage. In contrast, cannabis has been consumed for thousands of years across many cultures. Like any enduring cross-cultural phenomenon, individuals within the culture will have been exposed to it and have formed an opinion of it. Strong prior expectations of clinical utility - positive or negative - inevitably produce some degree of cognitive dissonance when these expectations are juxtaposed with the ambiguous literature.