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"Our concern is that the propositions were passed without the benefit of scientific research and outside the established drug approval process," notes the Area 5 action paper.
The authors recommend that a recent position statement by the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry (AAAP) be reviewed by APA's Joint Reference Committee and Council on Addiction Psychiatry.
The AAAP strongly opposes the legalization of drugs and specifically the California and Arizona propositions allowing medical use of marijuana.
The AAAP position is that "research should be conducted to determine the validity of claims that marijuana eases pain, controls nausea in patients receiving chemotherapy, relieves intraocular pressure in glaucoma, and combats anorexia in AIDS patients or those with other debilitating conditions."
The AAAP also urges that the FDA approval process be followed before legalizing the medical use of marijuana. If approved by the FDA, marijuana should be classified as a controlled substance by the Drug Enforcement Administration, similar to benzodiazepines.
Legalization notwithstanding, "compassion for the ill should be a guiding principle in the assessment and approval process of marijuana's medical efficacy. The door should be kept open for new evidence and regimens [that] may alleviate suffering," the statement urges.
In another research-related vote, the Assembly approved an action paper calling for a national empirical study of the potentially healing aspects of the physician-patient relationship.
"Today, there is considerable need to preserve the physician-patient relationship in the face of economic and organizational changes in medicine," states the Area 3 paper.
To study the healing aspects of the doctor-patient relationship, the authors recommend that the Council on Research explore a national strategy to examine clinical studies with a placebo control.
(Psychiatric News, June 20, 1997)