Declaration of Robert V. Brody, M.D.

Chief of the Pain Consultation Clinic at San Francisco General Hospital; Clinical Professor of Medicine and Family and Community Medicine at the University of California-San Francisco; former Medical Director of both Hospice and AIDS Programs (1988-1994) and Visiting Nurses and Hospice of San Francisco (1996-1997).

Dr. Brody's declaration discusses: types of conditions that cause chronic and acute pain; opiod pain medications and their side effects, including nausea; the effectiveness of prescrition anti-nauseants and Marinol; reported effectiveness of marijuana; methods of injesting marijuana and purity issues; concerns about recommending marijuana to patients.

Declaration of Richard I. Gracer, M.D.

I am a physician licensed to practice in the States of California, Texas, and Arizona, specializing in orthopedic medicine and the treatment of chronic pain. I maintain a private practice in San Ramon, California, in which a large percentage of my patients suffer from severe chronic and/or episodic pain. I am also the Director of Orthopedic Medicine for ChiroView, a nationally certified physical medicine review organization. I am a Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians, and certified by the American Board of Family Practice. I am also a Diplomate of the American Academy of Pain Management. I am a member in good standing of the Society of Orthopedic Medicine, the American Association of Orthopedic Medicine, the British Institute of Manual Medicine, and the California Medical Association. I present lectures and conduct seminars regionally and nationally in the fields of pain management and orthopedic medicine.

For a small number of patients, even aggressive opiate therapies are not sufficient. Unless alternative pain treatments are found for such patients, they will continue to suffer. For those individuals, their daily lives are often tortuous. As a physician, I am acutely aware of the disturbing connection between intractable pain, overwhelming despair, and suicide.

I can state confidently, as a physician with an extensive practice and specialized expertise in pain management, that marijuana can prove (and has proven) medically useful to at least some chronic pain patients. Accordingly, I believe that physicians should be able to recommend and/or prescribe marijuana to patients for whom it is medically appropriate. Absent that authority, my ability to treat my patients and provide relief from horrific pain is undermined, as is the trust essential to therapeutic relationship.