Methods of Delivery with Cannabis Medicine - How Can Organtica Help?

Using cannabis medicine can be a very individual experience. Not only do our patients have a wide variety of ailments that they use cannabis for, every individual may have a totally different experience than the next person. Our Organtica clinicians can help!

There are so many nightmare stories about people who have had a bad time with cannabis medication that is just too strong. We won’t let that happen. We also hear that patients are directed to use medications that just don’t work for them. We certainly want every patient’s personal cannabis experience be a good one, so our clinicians will be proud and pleased to help find the best medical cannabis product or flower strain for each individual. If it doesn’t work, bring it back for refund or exchange for another product to try.

Many patients use a variety of products depending on what they want to achieve and when they want to medicate. Uplifting daytime use? Night time relaxation or deep sleep? All of the above? This can all be achieved when you consult with one of our experienced clinicians. Very soon we will have Cannabis Nurses available to do consults with patients new to cannabis as medicine.

Cannabis Medicine, Methods of Delivery

Cannabis medicine isn’t just about smoking joints and bowls, although many patients find quick relief by smoking. This isn’t the sixties anymore, and there are many more effective ways to medicate with cannabis.

Inhalation – Smoking and Vaping – Smoking a joint or pipe is retro, but people still like the convenience. Smoking has it’s issues, but cannabis is much less dangerous than tobacco because studies show that THC actually protects the lungs. Using a vaporizer has also become popular and is a good alternative to smoking since it eliminates the waxes, tars and carbon inhaled when smoking the conventional way with flame (combustion). Vaping can be done with a small vape pen or a larger vaporizing machine. Different apparatus may be used for vaping flower (plant matter) or vaping concentrated like oils and taffy-like shatter and wax. Although vaping is safer than smoking, it still isn’t the most effective in the long term. Absorption of cannabinoids takes place the fastest with both of these methods, so it gives the quickest relief. The cannabinoids enter the body through the lungs and travel through the blood, first to your heart and then very quickly to the brain and other organs as it is pumped throughout the body. However, only about 15% of the cannabinoids present in the product are actually absorbed. This method is great for quick relief of symptoms, but isn’t ideal for people who must go to a job or have no place to medicate in this fashion often enough for the efficacy they need. Effects will last 1 to 3 hours with a minute or less for onset. Efficacy peaks within minutes, but the decline is slow. The length of the effects can vary from strain to strain.

Oral Delivery/Capsules and Edibles – (ingestion by digestion) With a 35% absorption rate, you certainly get a big bang for your buck with edibles, but they have their drawbacks too. Even though they are probably the best way for anyone to get a full night of restful sleep, oral delivery is very easy to go over board with on dosing. Edibles taste good so it’s easy to reach for another and the calories can be worse than a Big Mac. Smoking a strong bowl of a relaxing flower or joint can certainly put a person to sleep quickly, but it won’t keep you sleeping for all the hours you need. The edibles take the longest to be absorbed into your system, but last 8 to 12 hours. This is because the THC travels through your digestive tract to your liver where it’s metabolized and converted to a different form of THC, called delta 11 THC. Unlike the delta 9 THC, which is what most people are used to experiencing when smoking cannabis, delta 11 is much more reactive, much more sedative and lasts a very long time, up to 8-10 hours. This can be great for sleep applications as well as micro dosing throughout the day, but can be pretty overwhelming for the patient who doesn’t know their dose and consumes too much. You’ve all heard the stories, and yes, they are true.

Oral/Sublingually – (drops under the tongue) and oral sprays – Mucus membranes in the mouth absorb the cannabinoids quickly, and release them into your bloodstream, bypassing the digestive tract and the liver. This doesn’t happen as fast as with inhalation, but is much faster than eating cannabis medicine. The absorption rate is about the same as inhalation because the cannabinoids are headed to your heart and distributed your brain and other organs through your bloodstream. You will get high, but sublingual cannabis medicine is usually taken in small doses – more often, so they are a good way to control the high with a small yet effective dose. The dose must be held in the mouth for as long as you can. Swallowing it immediately means it will be metabolized like an edible, thought the gastrointestinal system instead of directly into the bloodstream.

Oromucosal – This method is the latest and greatest, but is not readily available to patients at this time. This new method is like sublingual except that the measured dose is applied to the inside cheek or on the gums in your mouth instead of under the tongue. The absorption rate is a bit higher than with sublingual application, and the onset is a bit slower taking 15 minutes to an hour.

Suppositories – This is the one of the newest delivery methods in the cannabis world and it is gaining popularity fast because it’s highly effective medicinally and has little to no high, depending on dosage. Many people are a bit alarmed when a suppository medicine is suggested, but cannabis oil suppositories have the greatest absorption rate of all the methods of ingestion. Nearly 80% of the medicine in the suppositories is absorbed directly into your system through the gastrointestinal tract’s cell walls, or, if used vaginally, through the vaginal wall. This method is especially helpful for people suffering from a host of diseases located in this region of the body, like Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, Inflammatory Bowel Syndrome, Crohn’s Disease, Endometriosis, and more. Our digestive tract has a big connection to many autoimmune diseases and this method is a very good way to treat those issues as well. Although all ingestion methods will release some level of THC into your bloodstream, and some of it will make it to your liver, suppositories will be different in that the majority of the cannabinoids will be absorbed into cannabinoid receptors before it ever gets to your liver. Not much THC is left to get converted to delta 11 THC or to make it to your brain. You will get a feeling of well being and the relief may make you feel pretty darn good, but it won’t be the euphoric or intoxicating brain high. Using cannabis medicine in suppository form will allow much higher dosing without the corresponding high, as is often needed when fighting cancer, bowel diseases and some autoimmune disorders. They are very useful for hospice and palliative scenarios since high doses are often needed for relief. Suppositories offer so much less of a high, allowing patients to function and socialize better than when morphine and other opioids are used.

Topical/Transdermal – When using cannabis liniments, salves, balms, patches and the such, as well as bath salts bath bombs and bath oils, the cannabinoids don’t enter the bloodstream quickly, but they are absorbed by cannabninoid receptors that linger nearby the application area. Our skin layers have an abundance of CB1 and CB2 receptors. Because our skin is our body’s first line of defense against intruders and doesn’t let just anything in, topicals should be used liberally to assure absorption. Natural carrier oils should be a part of the topical because like attracts like, and the oils on our skin barrier will assist absorption. Alcohol based topicals will also aid absorption, but they can be tough on the skin. Topical cannabis products will not really get you high, but will relax you and provide extended pain relief. Absorption into the bloodstream is very slow, often longer than cannabis edibles, (and this may be the reason people don’t really get high from topicals). The absorption rate is the lowest of all the methods at less than 10%, but the duration of efficacy is the longer than most methods at 6 to 10 hours. Again – the cannabinoid receptors are accessed directly which is a big plus for analgesic effects.

More in depth discussion of absorption can be found at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2689518/

How Organtica can help?

Organtica offers most all of the above categories of products, (with exception of Oromucosal since it not readily available here yet). Ask our clinicians to help you select the best medicine for you. We even have a line of “Slow Start” products for those people who are new to cannabis medicine and need a low starting dose. We aren’t here to get you high. We’re here to help! If you like some high and happiness too, that’s ok with us.