A perception persists in popular culture of cannabis primarily being taken by “stoners,” Cheech and Chong types, those among us wanting to leave the realities of life behind for a few fleeting moments or hours.

A subset of people fitting that characterization certainly exists, and yet, when used properly, cannabis is one of the safest substances to take to have that escape, that recalibration before diving back into the exigencies of daily life.

Through my experiences as a registered medical cannabis MD in New York State for more than 10 years, I’ve come to a broader understanding of our relationship to cannabis. This is not to say that cannabis, like any other substance with psychoactive properties, can’t be abused. On balance, however, in my practice and those of many of my colleagues, we have encountered a more nuanced landscape where patients, their families, and caregivers have gotten significant help in lives ravaged by an array of diseases, both physical and emotional.

Our vast endocannabinoid system (ECS), having connections in nearly every corner of our body and minds, seems to truly regulate overall homeostasis. When there is a disturbance in any bodily system, many have discovered that using cannabis can bring things back into balance. I don’t intend to claim that cannabis is a panacea, but rather to say that as a member of an increasingly large international community of cannabis practitioners and researchers, I have been involved with very gratifying shared experiences revealing how much cannabis can help with so many medical conditions.

Regarding that work and my clinical encounters, none is more personally and professionally exciting, intellectually provocative, and gratifying than the benefits I am seeing with my patients who have neuropsychiatric diseases, including neuropathy, epilepsy, migraines, Parkinson's disease, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and Alzheimer's disease (AD).

In spite of their diverse clinical manifestations,........

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