Medical marijuana patient with stage 4 cancer on health dept. rejection of his MMJ license
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment's recent rejection of nearly 2,000 medical marijuana patient licenses over a quiet rule change caused such an uproar that the department promised to temporarily reinstate licenses for around 1,300 MMJ users -- among them Larry Shurtleff, who suffers from stage 4 cancer. But he remains confused and anxious over the state jerking him back and forth.
"This has been just about unbearable on me," says Shurtleff, 53. "One day, I think everything's going good, and then I get shot back down again. I really don't know what's going on."
Some background: Amendment 20, the 2000 measure that legalized medical marijuana in Colorado, describes a physician allowed to recommend MMJ as "a doctor of medicine who maintains, in good standing, a license to practice medicine issued by the state of Colorado." But Senate Bill 109, a piece of legislation intended to clarify the relationship between doctors and medical marijuana patients, which became law in June, tweaked this definition, stating that a doctor in good standing must hold "a valid, unrestricted license to practice medicine in Colorado."
Beginning late last month, the health department began enforcing its understanding of the SB 109 standard. Since February or so, personnel had set aside recommendations written by doctors with either restrictions or conditions on their license, even though there's no specific mention of conditional licensees in the law. (Restrictions and conditions aren't synonymous.) Then, beginning late last month, they mailed letters to patients, informing them that their applications had been rejected because their doctors -- eighteen physicians were impacted statewide -- had been retroactively deemed unqualified to write recommendations.
This information threw Shurtleff, a hospice resident, into a panic, due in large part to the fact that medical marijuana has provided him with some of the only real relief he's experienced over the past five years or so.
Back in 2004 or 2005, Shurtleff says, a pea-sized tumor developed inside his left cheek. As it grew, he went to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with a sinus infection and prescribed antibiotics. But the tumor continued to increase in size -- so he saw another doctor, and after a battery of tests, he was determined to have stage 4 cancer.
Having lost a fiancee to breast cancer, Shurtleff was reluctant to submit to chemotherapy and radiation, but he decided to go forward with this treatment regimen anyhow. During the process, he lost all of his teeth and one eye, and he was in nearly constant, agonizing pain. When narcotic medication failed to give him comfort, his doctor suggested that he try marijuana. He initially resisted, but he eventually chose to give it a try following conversations with his sister, an MMJ patient herself, as well as a fellow patient at a nursing facility in Wheat Ridge.
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