When medical cannabis made its introduction into Utah back in March, the state was reporting that less than 30 Qualified Medical Practitioners (QMPs) had registered to enroll patients in the new program.
Today, according to the Utah Department of Health (UDOH), there are more than 400 medical professionals in the state that are registering Utah medical cannabis patients. A majority of those QMPs; however, are located in Salt Lake County, where a majority of medical cannabis patients are found.
Although this number is rising, what does it mean for rural Utah patients seeking help?
According to a report last year from the United States Department of Agriculture, Utah covers 82,144 square miles, and houses an estimated 3,205,958 residents – 335,301 of which are considered rural.
Utah is scheduled to have 14 medical cannabis pharmacies open throughout the state by the end of the year, but these locations are required by law to be assigned to populations with over 100,000 residents or more.
With QMP numbers soaring in the state, the UDOH acknowledges that those living in one of the 89 cities, towns, and villages in the state with 6,000 residents or less are unlikely to find a medical professional within city limits to help them with registration.
In order to bring reliable access to medical cannabis professionals in rural areas, the Natural Medicine Clinic of Utah (NCMU), a medical cannabis practitioner located in Lehi, is leveling up its operation to help patients in cities like Moab, Vernal, Ballard, and Beaver.
“It breaks our staff’s hearts knowing there are patients that aren’t receiving the treatment they deserve, and have waited so long for, because of a lack of access,” said Matt Poulton, Director at the NMCU. “Although we don’t have a pharmacy in our area [Lehi] yet, we are still issuing cards daily, and also getting calls from people over 100 miles away seeking help. Some drive to us, but some can’t. The decision came to us pretty easily to start Utah’s first mobile medical cannabis clinic.”
On July 11, Poulton loaded up his crew at UNMC, which consists of three QMPs and several office workers, and headed for Vernal in the company vehicle. They rented out the banquet room at the Marriott Hotel in town and started announcing their pending arrival to residents weeks before.
“All of our appointments were booked up before we left and we ended up getting 18 people registered for their medical cannabis cards,” said Poulton. “They should be receiving their official cards from the state within a few days.”
Although, this visit to rural Utah was the first of its kind, many other cannabis medical professionals are holding similar events in larger populated areas as pharmacies open their doors.
“Our response in Vernal was bigger than we expected, and we realized how necessary this type of service is,” Poulton said. “We have other cities on our radar to visit, but were approached by locals living on nearby reservations that were also seeking help, and will focus our attention there soon.”
As only three of 14 approved Utah medical cannabis pharmacies are currently open, the number of medical card holders is surpassing state expectations.
Director of the Center for Medical Cannabis at the UDOH, Rich Oborn, reported that Utah now has over 6,500 registered medical cannabis patients. This rising number does not include those still using defense letters, which would bring our current total closer to the state’s end of year projection of 10,000 patients.
Patients that hold defense letters and do not hold medical cards, either visited a medical professional that was not registered with the state, or have not finished applying for their medical card on the state’s website, according to Oborn.
Those with letters will need to finish the application process with the state, or revisit a registered medical professional, by January 1, 2021 in order to continue participating in the state’s cannabis program.
“I’m expecting the state will have anywhere between 10,000 and 14,000 patients by the end of the year,” said Oborn during an interview with Salt Baked City. “What I hope will happen, [is] that those who only hold recommendation letters will convert and become fully registered medical cannabis card carrying patients. They can go legally purchase cannabis right now from one pharmacy until the end of the year with just a recommendation letter, but their transition will increase our number of participating patients quite a bit because I know there are a lot of people that fall into that category.”
Stay tuned rural #greenscene, we’ll be reporting the next departure of the Utah Natural Medicine Mobile Clinic as soon as it’s announced. If you would like to add your area to the NMCU list, leave the name of your city, town, or village in the comments below.
