NEW YORK, NY June 18, 2007 —Among the items to be resolved in the waning days of New York's current legislative session is whether to legalize marijuana for medical use. One bill has passed the Assembly, and there is support for some kind of new law from Governor Spitzer and senate leaders. But as WNYC’s Fred Mogul reports, some local doctors caution that medical marijuana can be a mixed bag.

REPORTER: Certain types of doctors field a lot of questions about pot – for example, oncologists, from their patients with advanced cancer or pain management specialists who work with sufferers of multiple sclerosis. Dr. Russell Portenoy of Beth Israel Medical Center says he doesn’t discourage people who are using or want to try smoking marijuana, but he doesn’t recommend it, either. He believes it’s potentially effective, but says it’s very difficult to control dose and strength or to know how it interacts with other medications.

PORTENOY: I would opt to try many things first because of the uncertainties I have about the safety and effectiveness of medical marijuana.

REPORTER: Portenoy consults for a British company seeking FDA approval for a pharmaceutical extract of marijuana. Although he counsels caution, he and others say that if a patient is in severe pain and clearly close to death, they would be more willing to let patients experiment. For WNYC, I’m Fred Mogul.