Medical cannabis educator, Sativa Learning, will be educating doctors of the Mauritius Ministry of Health & Wellness on cannabis medicine.
Whilst all forms of cannabis are currently illegal in Mauritius, the government is now exploring the possibility of legalising medical cannabis.
In 2021, the country established a Technical Committee in the Ministry of Health and Wellness to assess and make recommendations on the use of medical cannabis, chaired by Professor Theeshan Bahorun, executive director of the Mauritius Research and Innovation Council (MRIC).
Read more: Sativa Learning – on a mission to provide cannabis education
Subsequently, the committee produced a report providing recommendations for the country to implement, including the use of both CBD and THC products as medicines, the implementation of a patient registration or cardholder system, only using FDA-approved products, only importing products in the initial stage of the programme and for cannabis medicine to only be used in hospitals.
UK education platform, Sativa Learning, which provides CPD-accredited and CPD-certified online courses on medical cannabis, has been requested by the Mauritius Ministry of Health & Wellness to educate the country’s doctors on the medicinal use of cannabis.
The government is now requiring any private clinic or specialist doctor in the country to complete the Sativa Learning courses and to forward their certificates of completion to the Minister of Health and Wellness in order to obtain a licence to prescribe.
Sativa Learning founder, Ryan McCreanor, commented: “We’ve had around 25 specialist doctors from Mauritius sign up so far. The Ministry explored a number of different courses and they found ours very helpful so, have made the decision that people must take our course.
“They decided that this was a very suitable course as a first learning experience for any prescribers or any specialist doctors wanting to prescribe.
“The course that we’ve created is in partnership with the UK Medical Cannabis Clinicians Society (MCCS). We have nine doctors from the MCCS who have helped develop the educational content, and we also have a lot of patients who came together to create the content.”
Sativa Learning’s course covers a range of topics from fibromyalgia and chronic pain to PTSD and epilepsy, featuring experts on how to prescribe, and patients sharing their experiences with medical cannabis.
McCreanor said: “This is what we’ve been working towards – being able to educate the likes of government organisations and health ministries.
“I think it’s a fantastic achievement for us and it just goes to show that we’ve done all the right things to make this course the best value for learning for medical professionals by going through the accreditation and bringing in the true experts in each area.”
The course features insights from some of the world’s leading cannabis experts including Dr Danny Gordon, Dr Evan Lewis and Professor Mike Barnes.
“Mauritius is making sure that its specialist doctors are fully educated,” added McCreanor. “As far as I’m aware, there isn’t a requirement like this in the UK at this stage. Specialist doctors should show some proof of having educated themselves to a certain degree with medical cannabis. I think that will go a long way to advance prescribing medical cannabis and patient access in the UK.”
Sativa Learning recently won an award for Innovative Startup of the year in Northern Ireland’s Startup Awards National Series and is currently looking for investment as it develops its course offerings.
Its most recent offering is a free online Cannabis Fundamentals course that will be launched soon.
The one-hour course will be for those who are new to cannabis and want a better understanding of the plant.
The course consists of a mix of text and image-based learning as well as video content, concluding with a final exam and upon successful completion. Through the course, learners will earn an industry-recognised certification to acknowledge their achievement.
The course covers:
• The taxonomy of cannabis
• The difference between hemp and cannabis
• The endocannabinoid system
• Plant chemistry – Cannabinoids, terpenes and flavonoids
• How cannabis works as a medicine
• And more
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