To provide a medical cannabis product review, please sign up for Catalyst (by honahlee). 

It’s important to note that we don’t take Google style starred reviews. We request that you provide a more feedback based approach so that we can capture your experience specifically related to your condition and symptoms because that’s more helpful for both patients and health professionals.

Help create an Australian medical cannabis review (product feedback) forum

honahlee is committed to providing cannabis consumers with a safe place to learn about their products. While the current framework in Australia is mainly medicinal, it’s important for patients to understand the entire medical cannabis landscape.

Knowing which products are available and hearing how those products have helped (or have not helped) others with their condition is valuable in a patient’s journey. Product feedback is also invaluable for health professionals as it can be seen as real world evidence. 

Cannabis doesn’t work for everyone and understanding the difference between products and their effects/side-effects is critical.

We believe that having one place for patients to read and submit medical cannabis product reviews is vital for the growth of a collective patient community, patient knowledge, prescriber knowledge and the industry overall.

If you’d like to provide product feedback, please visit Catalyst.

Thanks for taking the time to help your fellow patients by submitting your reviews.

Why do medical cannabis product reviews matter?

There are over 100,000 active medical cannabis patients in Australia and this number is growing rapidly. While GPs and regulatory bodies are still learning about how to treat medical cannabis, the broader cannabis community has their own perception. There are pros and cons to each, however, what everyone can agree on is that cannabis is not your traditional pharmacological medication.

There are four main reasons why a medical cannabis product review page is valuable for the community:

  1. Cannabis product feedback helps doctors and patients understand which products are working best for certain medical conditions.
  2. Cannabis is a patient-doctor driven treatment and both parties need more information.
  3. Reviews improve patient engagement in their own treatment.
  4. Transparency will benefit regulators, patients and medical practitioners alike. 

When it boils down to it, understanding patients’ experiences with legal medical cannabis products improve the safety of the industry.  Cannabis is not your traditional pharmacological medication. With improved patient knowledge, the entire legal landscape can evolve into something regulators, manufacturers, doctors and patients can all be proud of.

Reviews (feedback) improve doctor and patient knowledge of products for conditions

We’ve spoken with many doctors and there are two things that most of them agree on:

  1. Most of the time, patients who use cannabis are seeing improvements in their symptoms.
  2. It’s very difficult to know which products are working best for which conditions. 

While the medical experts in charge keep saying that there isn’t enough evidence, cannabis has been used in the medical space for thousands of years. Cannabis has more evidence than most of the drugs people take over the counter. Unfortunately, that evidence isn’t from double-blind, placebo based trials.

The problem with our current medical landscape is that the cannabis manufacturers who market to doctors and patients best win the biggest piece of the patient pie. And, because we know cannabis isn’t like traditional pharmacological medications and the ROI for big pharma isn’t there, we also know that it’s unlikely we will ever have really strong clinical evidence in the way the medical leaders want.
Short term, and maybe even long term, the best evidence we can get is from patient experiences. Patient experiences or case studies provide doctors and other patients with non-biased data to embark on their treatment journey. Cannabis product feedback provides both patients and doctors with a transparent forum to learn more about what’s working and what’s not.

Cannabis is a patient-doctor driven treatment and both parties need more information

Unlike our modern “traditional” pharmacological treatments, cannabis is a very individualised medicine. Sure, the drugs you buy over the counter or are prescribed by a doctor don’t work for every person, but most have a standardised dose (i.e. take one tablet, twice a day after meals).

Cannabis is almost always unique for each individual. Cannabis as medicine needs more information and knowledge from a patient standpoint than most other medications. The mantra of start low and go slow is repeated time and time again for both CBD and THC products alike. 

Because cannabis is so ‘new’ and doctor education and uptake is slow, quite often patients are required to learn about their treatment (and teach their doctors about it) as they go. Cannabis product reviews won’t tell people exactly what to do or how to do it, but it gives people guidance and confidence in their treatment.

Medical cannabis reviews improve patient engagement

Patient engagement in any medical treatment is important for success. With the current cannabis landscape, particularly the lack of knowledge from doctors, patient engagement will also improve doctor engagement.

There are a number of social forums where people go to ask questions and learn about their medical cannabis products. So, whether or not doctors, product manufacturers or regulators like it, people are getting this information. We just need to make sure that it’s valid and easily understandable 

Because cannabis isn’t a typical pharmaceutical, understanding other patient’s medication habits, dosages, and overall outcomes can help inform the information you collect on your treatment and how you engage with your medication practitioner. Legal cannabis product reviews will help with patient engagement.

Important note:

It’s important to note that seeing product feedback from other patients won’t tell you exactly how the product will work for you. Medical cannabis may not work for you. That said, knowing more about the product, how people are consuming it, what benefits and side effects they’ve had is helpful in gathering more context for your own treatment.

Transparency benefits regulators, patients and medical practitioners alike

In conclusion, transparency in the medicinal cannabis arena is key to not only the success of the space but also patient safety.

Due to current regulations, there is so much fragmentation of information. There are numerous grey areas within the laws regarding medical cannabis product importation, production, pricing and distribution.As a result, even prescribers aren’t always clear on what to do.

As a community who cares about each other, it’s crucial that we all contribute to the creation of a new medical space where all involved are educated and able to make the best choices for those who will be using medical cannabis as a treatment. While product reviews and patient feedback won’t be the final answer, they are most definitely another step in the right direction.