Utah’s medical marijuana industry off to rocky start

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (KUTV) – Utah’s first medical marijuana pharmacy is open for business but it’s having trouble getting patients because of confusion with the new cannabis law.

Dragonfly Wellness, the state’s first medical marijuana pharmacy, opened on Monday ready to sell to customers.

They had sixteen customers on day one. On day two, there was a problem.

Co-owner Hoang Nguyen says she’s turned away a lot of patients who did not meet with the right doctor and who did not have the right paperwork.

Nguyen explained, “In those first two days, we had to turn away over 200 patients who thought that they, the letter from their doctor was good enough to them through the pharmacy door.”

She said patients and doctors still aren’t clear now how the medical marijuana program works. “We are trying to get to the bottom of what we can do to make it right for patients.”

Medical marijuana advocate Connor Boyack lobbied lawmakers this week to make another quick change in the law that would allow patients to temporarily use letters from any doctor until they meet with a doctor who is registered in the program and that way get an official card to enter the pharmacy.

“This is just a temporary stopgap,” Boyack explained. “Right now, the registered doctors are being bombarded with patients who want to get their cards and there is a big backlog.”

The state health department says 1,200 patients have applied for cards since Sunday but many aren’t approved yet because patients haven’t met the requirements.

Rich Oborn with the Utah Department of Health said, “There’s over 700 that are in a status of what we call ‘awaiting certification.’”

Nguyen said her pharmacy needs customers but medical marijuana is new and she is willing to be patient. “It’s new to everyone right now,” she said. “This entire state, we are all trying to be pioneers here.”

The Department of Health says sixty medical providers are registered with the program. Patients can only obtain a card after meeting with one of those medical providers who can diagnose them with one of the required medical conditions and certify their application.

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