Guide To Selecting Medical Strains
This is a work-in-progress and not ready for use.
There are over a thousand strains of cannabis known to researchers, with new hybrids and crosses appearing every month. Due to the complexities involved in growing medical cannabis, growers are not always able to keep dispensaries stocked with every strain that they produce.
This can create a jarring experience for patients who just want cannabis to follow conventions that other medications have (like having the same strain consistently named and available). When you add a very competitive marketplace with fluctuating prices, it gets even harder for patients who just want consistent relief when taking [set amount] of [thing].
This guide is written for those patients, in hope that it will be useful. It's an evolving guide that could use your input and contributions, see the about page for information on contributing.
Step 1: Define Your Goals By Resting / Active Modes
In our example, we:
- Want anxiety relief when resting and active
- Want pain relief when resting and active
- Want help sleeping
- Want help focusing when active
These are things that we'd like to be able to say are true as a result of our treatment with cannabis.
Your list might look different. What's important is, you keep it to one wish per line, and be very specific about if you'll be resting or active when it should be taking effect.
Step 2: Define Anti Goals
Anti-goals are things that ideally do not happen as a result of treatment with cannabis. When coming up with these, put a number between 1 and 5 to represent exactly how much you don't want the thing to happen.
In our example, we:
- Do NOT want dry eyes or dry mouth when active (3)
- Can not feel tired when active (5)
- Would rather not smell strong odor (1)
Step 3: Consult Your Allergist If Applicable
Even if you've had cannabis before, you might be allergic to certain terpenes and not know it, because you've have yet to have cannabis that contains them specifically.
Cannabis contains some of the same compounds found in fruits, nuts and other places like fragrances. If you do have frequent allergies, it's worth checking before trying a wide variety to see what works.