The public image of medical marijuana, as portrayed by the media, is of a patient inhaling deeply on a marijuana cigarette with plumes of smoke wafting overhead. To be sure, smoking marijuana is one of the fastest and most efficient ways for patients to experience the therapeutic properties of cannabis due to the swift uptake of the medicine into the blood stream through the capillaries in the lungs. Many medical marijuana patients, however, ingest their medicine in other ways, and for many reasons. For example, some patients have compromised pulmonary or immune systems that could be damaged by the inhalation of burned particulates or fungispores. Other patients simply do not like to smoke, or need to ingest their medicine in places where smoking is not permitted.

As a result, patients have developed various ways to ingest their cannabis-based medicine. In addition, pharmaceutical companies, most notably GW Pharmaceuticals of Great Britain, are developing safe and acceptable mechanisms for delivering marijuana into the blood stream. Alternatives to smoked cannabis include (but not limited to): infusing it into tea, blending it into milkshakes or other beverages, baking it into brownies or other baked goods, and vaporizing it into an inhaler.

Gieringer Ph.D., Dale. "Marijuana Water Pipe and Vaporizer Study." Newsletter of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). 1996. 6(3).

Mirken, Bruce. "Vaporizers for Medical Marijuana." AIDS Treatment News. 1999. 327.

"Cal NORML/MAPS Study Shows Vaporizer Can Drastically Reduce Toxins in Marijuana Smoke" -- Cal NORML Press Release, [5/1/03]