Montana Begins New Medical Marijuana Restrictions

The Montana Medical Marijuana industry has received a lot of publicity in the past several weeks. Now, Medical Marijuana Montana is in the spotlight again, but not due to any more raids.

The Montana Department of Health, which administers and regulates the Montana Medical Marijuana program has tightened restrictions regarding qualifying patients. The new regulations are formally introduced on July 1, 2011, but the DOH have begun issuing registration cards to new patients based on the updated restrictions.

The first aspect of the new restrictions is the acceptance of chronic pain. Montana has over 30,000 registered Medical Marijuana patients--one of the highest ratios of patients to overall residents of any state that allow Medical Marijuana. Of that 30,000 a large percentage are for chronic pain. To combat what the DOH considers an abuse of the system, any patient now seeking chronic pain as a qualifying condition must have physical proof in the form of xrays--or have a second physician affirm a chronic condition.

The other aspect of the new regulation, is that Montana will no longer allow registered patients of other states that allow Medical Marijuana to be protected from prosecution for possession while in Montana.

Needless to say, abruptly changing regulations, as well as the confusion over the numerous raids, has left patients and caregivers very confused over the interpretation of the Montana Medical Marijuana program.