Hiya Nerd;

with all due respect, I am not only a freelance writer but one whose loved ones have had the very conditions which medicinal marijuana is prescribed for, so maybe have a bit more closeness to the issue. I have also studied alternative medicine and am a healer in my own right. Also, I have met doctors who, despite their medical degress, ahd little to no practical knowledge about nutrition,   sexuality, immune system health, you name it. I think our society in general places too much faith in someone just because they have a piece of paper in their hand that says they know such and such. A doctor necessarily has knowledge of internal medicine and anatomy, but, unless they have specifically gone to soem effort to stufy the data and efficacy of medicinal marijuana, and that includes anecdotal reports, then they are no more qualified, and perhaps less so, than I am to speak on the subject. Just as an endocrinologist will have knowledge a gynecologist does not, and vice versa. Why should Dean be better able to address this issue than a layperson who has studied it to a greater degree than he has? That doesn't even make sense. There are plenty of incarcerated prisoners who, after years of studying law books on their own, make beter lawyers than the ones who represented their cases in the first palce. Knowledge and wisdom are not automatically conferred by a title or even a formalized education.

here's a bet to place some money on: ask your average GP how to deal with a digestive complaint and odds are they will say nothing about nutrition. Doctors can be great; but they can also be woefully misinformed (just as you're claiming "health writers" can be) and unable to deal with things on the most pragmatic level.