Tell your doctor. According to the Michigan poll, 44 percent of monthly cannabis users said they had not discussed it with their healthcare providers. Your doc can tell you if medications you may be taking, such as blood thinners, statins, antihistamines, antidepressants, and medications with sedative effects, interact with cannabis. Your doctor may also be able to give you guidance on how to access medical cannabis—though it won’t be covered by Medicare or other insurance because it’s still illegal on the federal level—and help you monitor your use to see whether it’s helping or not. Avoid smoking and vaping. Using cannabis in these forms may cause health problems just like smoking or vaping tobacco, Quinlan says.
Be wary about THC content labels. Most research indicates they’re not reliable. So if you’re going to use cannabis, opt for the lowest possible dosage (which may be an edible with 5 mg of THC or less), especially if you haven’t used the substance before, Quinlan says. Plus, it’s now easy to find cannabis products with a strength of 20 to 30 percent. The average potency in the 1990s was around 4 percent, Bonar says.
