Apply For Your Ohio Medical Marijuana Card

Cannabis is illegal for recreational use in the U.S. state of Ohio, but ownership of up to 100 grams is decriminalized. Legislation was enacted in 2016 to allow a regulated system for the cultivation, sale, and possession of medical marijuana, but the system did not enter into force until 2017.

A law on medical marijuana, House Bill 523, adopted by Gov. John Kasich in 2016 and signed into law. The legislation permitted the use of medical cannabis in the form of edibles, oils, patches and vaporization by patients with 21 conditions, including cancer or chronic pain. Patients and their caregivers are permitted to have a supply of up to 90 days.

By Ohio law, medical marijuana can be used to treat 21 qualifying conditions:

• AIDS
• Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
• Alzheimer’s disease
• Cancer
• Chronic traumatic encephalopathy
• Crohn’s disease
• Epilepsy or another seizure disorder
• Fibromyalgia
• Glaucoma
• Hepatitis C
• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Multiple sclerosis
• Pain that is either chronic and severe or intractable
• Parkinson’s disease
• Positive status for HIV
• Post-traumatic stress disorder
• Sickle cell anemia
• Chronic Pain
• Spinal cord disease or injury
• Tourette’s syndrome
• Traumatic brain injury
• Ulcerative colitis

All patients with medical marijuana and their caregivers will have to register with the State Pharmacy Board. The card itself is printed online, but it can be laminated at your convenience.

A registration of a patient or caregiver will be valid from the date of issue and will expire one year later, the last day of the month it was given. The patient’s registration expires after six months if the patient is diagnosed as terminally ill.

The State Medical Board of Ohio has now cleared 139 physicians to recommend treatment with marijuana, including doctors in Beavercreek Twp., Centerville, Dayton, Enon, Mason, Middletown, Springboro, Springfield, Washington Twp., West Chester Twp. and Yellow Springs.

There are multiple dispensaries now selling cannabis to patients all around Ohio. You can purchase THC and CBD based products at dispensaries in Ohio.

Becoming a caregiver is simple and easy, according to Ohio’s medical marijuana caregiver resource, requiring the following steps:

• Registry Identification Cards: All patients and caregivers who wish to obtain medical marijuana must receive a state-issued medical marijuana patient ID card.
• Caregiver Eligibility: No more than two medical marijuana patients can serve as caregivers for individuals 21 and older. Up to two caregivers can be available for each patient.
• Patient and caregiver registration: The recommended physician or physician delegate must send the name of the caregiver and patient to the medical marijuana patient and caregiver registry of the Ohio Board of Pharmacy following their medical marijuana advice.
• Registration fees: A patient’s annual registration fee is $50. Caregivers ‘ registration fee is $25. On this registration fee, veterans receive a 50 percent discount.
• Minors: Patients under the age of 18 are needed to serve as their caregivers with a parent or legal representative.

Unfortunately, due to the restrictions on how many patients a caregiver can care for, in many other states with active medical marijuana programs, marijuana patient-caregiver services are effectively banned in Ohio. Starting in November 2018, the Ohio Medical Marijuana Control Program will enable appeals to Ohio HB 523. At some point in the future, though that remains to be seen, we may see a legal challenge to the caregiver-patient limit.

Patients suffering from one of the 21 qualifying medical circumstances need only be advised by their medical marijuana physician to become a caregiver by their caregiver. The physician sends this suggestion to the Pharmacy Board of Ohio, contacting the patient and caregiver to collect their registration charges. Patients and caregivers have access to every medical cannabis dispensary in Ohio after this stage.

Patients and/or caregivers of a patient are allowed to have a 90-day supply of any permissible type of cannabis as described by:

• No more than eight (8) ounces of medical marijuana of Tier I.
• No more than 5 and 3/10 ounces of medical marijuana of Tier II.
• No more than twenty-six and fifty-five grams of THC material in topical administration patches or lotions, creams or ointments.
• No more than nine and nine-tenths of THC material for oral administration in oil, tincture, capsule, or edible shape.
• No more than 53 and 1/10 grams of THC material for vaporization in medical marijuana oil

Home cultivation is not permitted.