California Docs Prescribing Medical Marijuana For ADHD

What will they think of next. Some doctors are taking the opportunity to prescribe medical marijuana for those kids suffering from ADHD.

Since 2004, California has given out more than 36,000 medical marijuana prescriptions. The number of these prescriptions going to children is not known, though experts say it's on the rise. And it's creating quite a controversy.

"Let me count the ways in which prescribing marijuana for teens with ADHD is a bad idea," Stephen Hinshaw, professor of psychology at the University of California at Berkeley, told Sphere.

"The active ingredient in pot, THC, causes short-term memory problems and inattention, the very same things you want a medicine for ADHD to help alleviate," Hinshaw said.

Others have fewer qualms about giving a kid with ADHD some pot.

"I'd have no hesitation giving a youngster with ADHD a trial of oral marijuana," Lester Grinspoon, emeritus professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and author of "Marijuana: The Forbidden Medicine," told Sphere.

Instead of simply prescribing a drug, how about double blind tests to see if there's actually any medical benefit from the use of medical marijuana instead of blindly claiming that it works or not.

Still, I can see plenty of opportunity for abusing this - both in diagnosis with ADHD and in treating with medical marijuana.