Pain management, Campobello Island

I viewed a webinar on arthritis and medical marijuana. There were some takeaways for general health issues. There are major three issues that affect we seniors:

pain, mood, sleep.

There were two physicians present information, there was nothing new, truthfully. They are things we should remember, however. Dr. David Conn, and Indigenous physician, Dr. Shelley Turner, did an overview of seniors, and pain management. Dr. Turner is doing research on medical marijuana and pain, getting her patients off opioids.

Exercise (your body and brain), eat well (mostly veggie rainbows), socialize, do everything in moderation (eating, alcohol), stop smoking, get a good amount of sleep. Also, get flu shots, as well as pneumonia and the shingles shots.

We can potentially watch for, or ameliorate some issues...

Arthritis is part of the issue...and very common in seniors. I have that, plus bursitis in my hip. JB has arthritis in his back, and has had some pain meds, too.

Typically, this is the opioid crisis, resolving pain can lead to more issues.

Having pain can lead to a horrid cycle

We know that body, mind and spirit and inextricably entwined.

arthritis.ca

The solution is complex. Our GPs don't know too much about many issues and some have a bias against medical marijuana, relying more heavily on addictive opioids.

We've been using marijuana for 6000 years!

Those of us who use medical marijuana order it by mail in Ontario, after getting a prescription from a doctor. I get mine through Canada Post. BTW: Recreational marijuana is legal for casual use in Canada. You cannot take it across the border, though.

This is an interesting problem

Campobello Island, which belongs to Canada, is only accessible by a US bridge year round. It is in New Brunswick, a maritime province, on the Bay of Fundy, right beside the state of Maine.




Canada Post trucks its mail to this island, via the USA. The US has been opening up Canada Post mail packages, prior to allowing it to cross back into Canada. It began with them confiscating marijuana, and then they began holding and opening all sorts of mail. What a pain in the butt!!

The island is home to 900 people, and they are getting ticked off. The solution, of course, is a ferry, but that will cost money.

 

Canada Post asks cannabis producers to stop shipping to ...

CTV News-Feb. 3, 2020

OTTAWA -- Canada Post has asked cannabis producers to stop shipping marijuana to a small island in eastern Canada.

This lady is so much fun!

Her arthritis was so bad she was ready to give away her piano — then her grandson suggested marijuana. https://t.co/bTrT48Qo4B pic.twitter.com/tNu6sOFrqz

— CBC News: The National (@CBCTheNational) February 17, 2020

A word of caution: do not ignore pain. Pain is a signal from the body to the brain meant to protect you. Sometimes it goes overboard, and it doesn’t necessarily reflect actual damage, but its purpose is to remind us to protect a diseased or damaged joint or strained muscle or tendon. Pain can be caused by something that we do (i.e. too much activity or the wrong activity) or don’t do (i.e. if we sit for long periods of time and don’t move around enough). It can also be caused by the arthritis disease process itself.

This is an excellent video on pain, from Australia.