A million scripts for medicinal cannabis but do doctors know what they are actually prescribing?
Doctors have flagged concerns over the quality and efficacy of medicinal cannabis products, alleging most suppliers are “bypassing” the TGA.
The warning comes amid an explosion in prescribing, with doctors and nurse practitioners writing more than one million scripts as of January 2024 and the number of individual prescribers jumping to more than 5700.
But while the industry is booming, out of an estimated 500 medicinal cannabis products being prescribed through the Special Access and Authorised Prescriber pathways, only two had been registered as therapeutic goods by the TGA.
The two registered products are Sativex, an oral mouth spray used to improve symptoms related to muscle stiffness in MS, and Epidyolex, an oral liquid cannabidiol for treatment of seizures associated with Dravet syndrome.
