Episode Transcript

Trevor: Kirk, We're back.

Kirk: Hey, Trevor. How's it going?

Trevor: Good. Winter is here.

Kirk: No shit. Sorry. For those that don't know, we live in the center of a continent, and it was like, what? -20 wind chill.

Trevor: 33 on my, -33 C. No wind chill when I got up this morning.

Kirk: -33. Yeah, I stepped outside at 3:00 in the afternoon and. Okay, I'm going back in. Cocooning. I actually got halfway through a novel today.  So

Trevor: Good for you. I'm not trying to start every story with a Rosy story about our new pup, Rosy, who loves the outdoors, loves the snow. Hates the booties. We're trying to make sort of a below -20 and -20 Celsius for you people south of the border, putting on booties that she hates them. But when she rips them off, she does the cold footie dance. So, yeah, it's a do we wrestle booties on to a dog or do we make them walk real short? So that's, you know how my mornings have been going last couple of days.

Kirk: Yeah yeah. Dogs, dogs and -30. My dog River has not has not ventured out of the house today. He went out in the morning, did his business and then just bolted back in. Short hair lab. 

Trevor: That's it, that's enough.

Kirk: Yup.

Trevor: Okay. Dog report over. Weather report over. Kirk, you talked to, I tried to find new acts to do. How about some very interesting people with a slightly difficult to say group, well, no, it's easy to say. Hard to read off the page. Anyway. EduCanNation. We have Jay Jay O'Brien and Shawna Dunbar.  What do we need to know about them before we go into this chat?

Kirk: Well, yeah, they are two new stories, basically. Once again, finding people that were drawn to cannabis because of medical issues and found cannabis as a last ditch and cannabis worked for them, but in the process became part of the cannabis story in that they are educators. They're coaches. They consider themselves educated cannabis coaches, cannabis educators, and they have formed an organization where they want to set the standard, the national standard. They're out of Ontario, the national standard for how people educate people about cannabis. So it's the story you know Trevor, we interviewed Terese Bowors in Episode 136. And what we learned is that, you know, as a regulated profession, as a nurse, I have all sorts of opportunities to bend my career in all sorts of places. So I've taken it into the cannabis space, sort of retreading. I retired, I quit my job. I'm now fulltime researching cannabis as a cannabis nurse. But there are limitations. If I was to open up a cannabis nursing practice, I would have a whole lot of restrictions such as records, con-ed, money. There's a whole bunch of restrictions that come from the College of Nurses, and I would have to maintain a scope of practice around cannabis, which wouldn't be difficult to do. But opening up a clinic would require records and stuff. So there are a lot of us not doing this because it's cumbersome, it's expensive and it requires databases and but there is a group out there that are not regulated professionals who are filling a void and they're cannabis coaches. And as cannabis coaches now they're gathering together and trying, attempting, to put a standard out there.

Trevor: No, and I agree. It's very interesting. In another regulated health care profession, there's lots of things I can and can't do. It is I think you guys said it well in there, you know, with not, being non-regulated or unregulated, there's a whole lot of latitude about what you can do. But maybe not as much sort of instant recognition for your skill or abilities because you don't have that "I'm regulated" stamp on it. And the other thing just just to kind of read here, we've got Jay Jay, who sort of found her way to cannabis while, recreationally had been use it for a while but used it, found it through cancer and Shauna who found it through her child and epilepsy and then I really like Shawn is quote so you can listen for this one. One of the reasons for her being one of the founders of EduCanNation was "I didn't think other mothers should have to stand in line with sketchy drug dealers to get a prescription." So, you know, listen for that. I like that one. I think that that's a good quote. That should be everywhere.

Kirk: That that reminds me of Episode 50. Ethan's Zohn. Ethan Zohn was he sort of said the same thing, how he was treating himself with cannabis while going through cancer; cancer care. And he was going to back alleys to get his, get his medicine.

Trevor: Ethan Zohn's profession. Former professional soccer player and winner of Survivor. Yeah, the TV show.

Kirk: Yeah. Yeah. We had him as a guest in Episode 50. So anyways, in, in this, in this particular episode, what I, what the listeners have to understand is that the first part of the discussion is, the ladies tell me how they found cannabis in their life and their relationship with cannabis, and then we move on to the association. And the whole premise of this story was to learn about their EduCanNation project. But we spent half of discussion just learning about their cannabis story. And listeners will know I, I love stories. I love people telling me stories. I like to hear people's stories and I love gathering cannabis stories. So this is this is actually two cannabis stories that lead into how they're setting a standard of care as educators.

Trevor: Yeah and obviously I wouldn't be in this podcast if I didn't love the stories too, but I think they do bring it nicely into, you know, why they thought there was a need, you know. Their journey leads, you know, quite seamlessly into education. But probably enough of us talking about that. Let us listen to Shawna and Jay Jay.

Jay Jay O'Brien: Thank you so much for having me Kirk. My name is Jay Jay O'Brien and I am based out of Cambridge, Ontario, Canada. I'm a certified cannabis health coach, an educator and executive co-chair at the nonprofit organization EduCanNation. And I'm a two-time cancer surthriver.

Shawna Dunbar: My name is Shawna Dunbar. I am also a certified medical cannabis educator. I've been in clinical practice since about 2016. I am also the executive co-chair at EduCanNation and a founder of EduCanNation. I came to the cannabis space because of my son, who has epilepsy and, you know, looking for an alternative medication for him and the loops and hoops and experiences that we had trying to obtain a cannabis prescription and proper guidance and, you know, information on dosing, information on cultivars and all of these things was really very difficult. And I thought no one should have to go through what we went through. And that's what drove me to start EduCanNation, wanting to spread the word about cannabis and make sure that people have access to credible education and credible guidance.

Kirk: Brilliant. I mean, that was going to be my first question. I want to get into EduCanNation, but you each have your own stories, so I guess, Jay Jay what is your story? How you found cannabis.

Jay Jay O'Brien: Of course. Yes. Well, I mean, cannabis has been a part of my life for my whole entire life, but I didn't really understand that it could be utilized as a medicine until I found myself in the situation in November of 2019, when I was diagnosed with stage four non-small cell lung cancer, I had metastasis to my bones, the lymph nodes, and I wasn't offered much options for treatment by my doctors. I was given six months to a year to live initially, and that's when I started looking for an alternative to that prognosis and rediscovered cannabis in a whole new way. I was suffering with a lot of pain from bone metastasis for almost a year, and then I learned about cannabis and took my first dose of cannabis oil. And I woke up the next day and I had no more pain. So that was a huge selling point for me. So I carried on with the medicine and I've continued on pain free and have managed my cancer the entire time as well. So that's where I am now.

Kirk: So Jay Jay, if you don't mind, I'd like to dig a little deeper. How long ago was the diagnosis?

Jay Jay O'Brien: It was November 20th, 19, 2019.

Kirk: So you were given six months? Yeah. And so here we are now. So did you receive traditional cancer therapies?

Jay Jay O'Brien: I did not do any chemotherapy or radiation or anything like that. I started on the cannabis oil and then it was about a month later that I discovered, well, doctors discovered that the cancer I was carrying had was caused by a genetic mutation. So they offered me a targeted therapy. That is, it's not a chemo radiation. It's just blocks of metabolic pathway that they say is linked to creating the cancer.

Kirk: Okay. And that's very cool. So you're using you're using cannabis then for pain management in this situation.

Jay Jay O'Brien: That's how it started out initially. I started utilizing it for, well, actually I started utilizing it as a treatment for cancer. And then the first thing it did was take away my pain. So that's kind of where it started. And then it had this snowball of effects that helped. Helped me grow, change, manage myself physically, spiritually, emotionally. Cannabis helped me in so many so many ways through my treatment. So I did not do any of the traditional treatments. But I do take a targeted therapy that blocks that metabolic pathways.

Kirk: I love people's cannabis stories, and sometimes I can get too deep. So I'm going to continue deep digging because I find this fascinating. Do you, are you using are you using a Rick Simpson's oil? Using a high percentage, and are you attributing any of the cannabis therapy to decreasing the cancer? Or is it purely just the pain management?

Jay Jay O'Brien: Yeah, like I said, when I first started on this journey and started with the cannabis oil, yes, the pain was managed immediately. But then I, you know, received reports from my doctors that the tumors were shrinking, the metastasis in my bones was disappearing and the lymph node activity was completely decreased. So that stayed that way for years, three years where I went in and they told me, you know, I was stable and unremarkable. Stable and unremarkable, which they say that's what you want to be. There's no changes or anything like that. And then I had a situation happen last year. I stopped taking the targeted therapy and I and I actually got the all clear from my doctors on 4 20 of 2023. I was given the all clear by my doctor. And so that was great news. But then it also made me a little bit complacent on my treatments and I wasn't taking targeted therapy. I kind of like reduced my cannabis dosing and then I ended up having a recurrence of cancer last year, August 20th, 23. I had 11 Tumors in my brain. And I started back on the targeted therapy as kind of a consolation prize to keep me out of the radiation room. And then I started back on cannabis oil in a very, very big way. Rick Simpson Oil. Full extract Cannabis oil. Goes by many names, but I was getting as much of it into me as possible. And within three weeks the 11 tumors were nine and the nine were a quarter of the size that they were. And within two months, the all 11 tumors were almost completely resolved.

Kirk: Well, thank you. Jay Jay.  We've done a few episodes with Cancer and Dr. Joe, and. Yeah, that's why you sparked my interest. But this is not why we were talking to you. But I do Shawna I want to hear about your son. You also got drawn into cannabis because, once again, you needed some help. So can you tell me a little bit about your story?

Shawna Dunbar: Absolutely. Like Jay, I've personally been utilizing cannabis since I was 12 years old. I didn't at the time know that it had medicinal value.

Kirk: That was for recreational purposes, I'm assuming.

Shawna Dunbar: Yeah, we can say that. I mean, I always kind of look at things as, you know, we tend to self-medicate as humans, right? Even if we're having drink to relax, to go to a social occasion or something. It's a form of self-medication. But yes, we can say I was using it at that age recreationally. My son had his first seizure when he was three years old. It was a status epilepticus type seizure, meaning that it lasts for a really long time. So he seized for over 20 minutes. I had to resuscitate him three times. Thankfully, my husband was away on a fishing trip, so my son and my daughter were having a sleepover and mama's bed. So had I not been sleeping next to him, I don't really like to think of what the outcome would have been. We immediately went to the hospital. I was told he was likely going to be severely brain damaged, so on and so forth. Thankfully, he was not. All was well. And we immediately went on to the pharmaceuticals because, you know, that's what you do there. I didn't know of any other treatment options at the time. Though we don't use pharmaceuticals a lot in our household. You know, when your son is faced with this type of condition, you kind of do what you're told. And we did that for several years. It did reduce the number of seizures that he was having as well as the duration of the seizures. So they were no longer lasting, you know, they say a seizure that lasts more than five minutes can be very dangerous. It can cause brain damage. So we weren't having those types of seizures anymore, but he was still having seizures. His type of epilepsy is a very rare type of epilepsy. It's called benign epilepsy. The majority of epilepsy is caused by brain damage or a brain defect. He has neither. He has a very healthy brain, so they don't know what causes it, but they know that it responds to the same types of medications. So we did the pharmaceutical route until he was seven years old, at which point I was really feeling uncomfortable with, number one, he's no longer you know, he's still having seizures. It's he's not seizure free. So his neurologist was continuing to increase the medication at every appointment. So he was taking the maximum dose at age seven for like an 18 year old and still having seizures. So, you know, I started researching. I was just like, there's got to be an alternative to this. And of course, cannabis was really the only thing that came up, but I had a really difficult time. So he was seven. I'm trying to think, what year was that? 2012. I was really having a hard time finding information on dosing, what type of products. I could see that CBD was something I should be looking for, but where do I find this? How do I administer it? How do I find a health care provider that is going to help us through this? And it was just it was just not happening. So I did two years of research, and then one day I went to the pharmacy to renew his pharmaceutical prescription, and I got told, I'm really sorry we have no more. Which I was like, Are you kidding me? Because it was a benzo that he was on and you cannot stop taking those medications. Actually, one of the side effects of stopping the medication is the type of seizure that we are using it for. So, you know, very dangerous to just stop. And I said, well, that's okay. Just give me the, you know, the other version, the off label brand or whatever. And they said, no, there's there's a shortage across the country because of our regulations, because it's a regulated pharmaceutical. They only are allowed to produce a certain amount, but because the type that he was taking is being prescribed more and more to children. We're seeing a rise in epilepsy in children. And this is one of the medications that has the least amount of side effects. It's being prescribed more, but the supply wasn't there. So the shortage actually lasted for over two years. And their solution was to prescribe him three other medications. So one very much stronger benzo to deal with the withdrawal symptoms and then two others to try to deal with the epilepsy. And I was just like, no, like no way am I putting my son through this. One of the side effects of one of the epilepsy medications because they're older ones, was severe, irreversible liver damage. And so I was going to have to bring him for a blood test every 3 to 6 weeks. And we would only find out that the damage happened afterwards and it's irreversible. Like and the other one, it was like, you know, suicide was the main side effects. Like it just was not sitting well with me as a mother. So with the research that I had done, I just got on the phone as soon as I got home. I knew we always kept an extra month worth of pharmaceuticals because we knew about the withdrawal symptoms, you know, like a just in case, right? So I literally had enough pills left. If I started weaning him that night, I could do it safely. So I started weening him immediately, even though I wasn't sure what I was going to do. When I got on the phone with everybody I knew in the cannabis industry, which led me to a 14 hour drive into Ontario to visit friends of a friend who was a veteran who had a prescription, and he was receiving his cannabis medication free of charge. So he started collecting what we figured we needed to treat my son. It took another year and a half for me to be able to obtain a legal prescription for him. That was a very difficult process to go to go through. No one was prescribing to pediatrics. We got our first prescription in a super sketchy clinic, stood in line with a gang, all who had the same broken arm, all who walked out with a 30g a day grow permit prescription. We walked out with 20g a day, no paperwork, no guidance, and absolutely nothing. So I really had to, you know, take things into my own hands. I was lucky to be had been put in touch with a couple of different health care providers. Corey Yelland was someone who helped us as well to guide us. And really, basically everyone said, You've done your research well, even the doctor who prescribed to us. And he literally said to me, Just keep doing what you're doing, Mama bear. You are doing a good job. Your son is doing well. Because at that point, by the time he got the prescription, my son was 100% seizure free. So he's actually been seizure free since I first started him on cannabis. He's never had another seizure. Even after we had weaned him from the pharmaceuticals, he's never had another seizure. He is now ten years seizure free.

Kirk: Very cool.

Shawna Dunbar: Yeah, his last EEGs show that he actually doesn't even have epileptic activity anymore. So I don't know if he's been cured. But this is his story.

Kirk: Carry on Carry on, one question and then I'd like to get into the organization. But you're how were you administering the cannabis to your son in the early days?

Shawna Dunbar: So I originally started him off on a 1 to 1, balanced in a in a tincture form at night, during the day in an oil form.

Kirk: So did you make your own oils with those early cannabis days or did the.

Shawna Dunbar: In the very early days I was using the oil base was from Aphria because that's where this veteran had his prescription. And, yes I know it was illegal for him to share to us. But this is, you know, this.

Kirk: it worked.

Shawna Dunbar: is where we were at.

Kirk: Yeah.

Shawna Dunbar: And then at night I, I would make a a tincture for him. So an alcohol extraction tincture, a traditional herbal tincture. And I did the 1 to 1 because I really felt that his, his type of epilepsy was literally only active while he's sleeping. So he doesn't have epilepsy during the day. He's not triggered by flashing lights or these types of things that other type of other types of epilepsy, you know, can have. So I just felt like he needed that extra support. And it was a gut feeling. It was just a gut feeling that I went with and it worked. So I then moved into, I started to realize that that the 1 to 1 balance during the day, I found him to be a bit hyperactive actually. So I decided to reduce the THC during the day and that seemed to work. So we did CBD dominant during the day. I eventually got my grow permit and was able to grow his medicine for him, process my own oils and I did oil infusions. I didn't feel that he needed because he was getting whole plant medicine. I didn't feel that he needed to go as far as the, you know, like FECO, those really potent extracts. So I would make edibles for him to make it easy, you know, healthy, you know,.

Kirk: That's great.

Shawna Dunbar: Healthy bars with all sorts of extra things. You know, I was always terrified of getting him high. So I would add in, you know, spices that have are high in Caryophyllene that help reduce the high of the THC. So he did that and he's actually always been a really, he's been really great at self-medicating and self-regulating so at a certain point, I would say around when he was about 12 or 13 years old, I started to notice that, you know, how come it's I'm due to make you some more edibles right now. How come there's still so many doses left in the fridge or left in the freezer and, you know, are you forgetting? And he was like, No, you know, I just kind of feel like I don't need it. And he was.

Kirk: Self-medicating.

Shawna Dunbar: Ya, he wasn't having seizures, so he eventually weaned himself off, you know, not weaned himself, but, you know, slowly reduced his daytime use of CBD. He did keep on the the 1 to 1 at night. Even after we got the results, that he didn't seem to have epileptic activity in his brain anymore. And I think it was more of a comfort zone for him. He still utilizes cannabis. He still has his prescription. He utilizes it as needed. Again, he's learned how to self medicate.

Kirk: Wonderful. I'd like to dig into your association so you basically two people that discovered cannabis for your own use and you saw a need. So can you please explain to me EduCanNation and how do you meet your mission? And your mission is providing the highest standard of responsible cannabis education. So walk me through that.

Shawna Dunbar: Well, we you know, my story led to me really feeling like other mothers shouldn't be standing in line with, you know, sketchy drug dealers. To get a prescription like there has to be something better than this. How can we get education out there? How can we get support out there? So the idea of education started in 2016. And I reached out to everybody that I knew in cannabis, but I wasn't finding the right fit. So in 2020, another educator reached out to me and said, Hey, there are other cannabis educators around out there and we are going to get together and see how we can support one another. So we had our first Zoom meeting in June of 2020. And I was so surprised and delighted to see other cannabis educators around the table. And the two that organized it are Stacy Bobak and Stephanie Massey. They also both came to cannabis for their own medical reasons. So they are both breast cancer survivors and they met in their breast cancer support group and they really just felt that cannabis educators needed like a water cooler, you know, a place where we could come together with our peers to find support, to be able to discuss our difficult cases with. To, you know, to help each other, manages our challenges and are wins as well. And we met every Friday, every week for several months. And we eventually I presented, I already had my business plan in place for EduCanNation, which is a nonprofit, and they really liked the idea. So we formed our board of directors and we incorporated as a nonprofit and started working together and built. We spent the first year, maybe two years, just beta testing our first tier of membership, which is really it's called our leadership membership, and it is designed for certified cannabis educators. We have a list of courses that we have reviewed that we've taken ourselves that we feel are up to par to our standards of education. So if you've taken one of those courses, if you have or you have equal experience, you can join the organization and we provide continued education. So we have our Friday Speaker series where we bring in experts to come and teach us and keep us up to speed on what's happening in the industry, what's happening in research, all of these types of things. Because as educators, we really need to keep on top of what's going on. And it's a very fast paced industry. We have our business support group as well. We are all entrepreneurs. This is not a regulated profession, so we're all kind of out there on our own. So we have our business support as well. Our master classes. We have our water coolers, which is our time to come and share our wins and challenges and, you know, just kind of be together on a more personal level.

Kirk: Okay. So I really want to spend some time on your standards. I am an Educator. I come from the traditional college format. I've built curriculum. I understand accreditation processes. So you're talking about standards and I appreciate that you are non-regulated and you're building from scratch, right? But if I'm thinking Reefer Medness - The Podcast would be a logical member to join this organization because we believe our podcast is about education. So where would I go as a potential member to find the standards? Like, how do you determine the standards? Where do I find the standards? Can you speak a little bit more about how your standards are accredited? Does that make sense?

Shawna Dunbar: Yeah, yeah, I think so. So we have an application process that our members have to go through. Like I said, there are different courses that we feel are credible. We have a list of those courses. Sometimes there are new courses that pop up as well. So, you know, we're always open. We work our membership on an individual basis so we get to know our members before they come in, basically, and then they learn our standards through their membership. So we have a video library of educational content that they have access to and we hope that they are accessing it. You know, where they get to learn what our standard is. We have we have some basic modules. Many of us as educators are either working one on one with patients or clients. And then there are those of us that are delivering cannabis education. So giving talks or creating content. And so we have specific modules, you know, recorded content, like I said, and documentation that our members have access to that outline those standards. So standards of practice, if you are working with a patients that we cover, protecting yourself as an educator, making sure that you are not stepping outside of your lane, that we are not all health care providers. Some of us are. So they are allowed to step into the different lanes that you know, they have the credentials for. But it's really once you are in the organization, it's creating. We have thought of including like a list of what our standards are to publish on our website, right, for a new member to access. But it's just way too long. It's too much information. So it's really within the organization that you can get access to that. We're very particular about how education is being presented. We have standards around language like let's move away from, for example, words like marijuana that are, you know, associated with racism. Let's just use the plants botanical name, cannabis, little things like that, changing the way we speak to the plant as well as how we do our research and where, you know, we know there's a lot of research that's out there. We know there's also a lot of misinformation out there. So we teach our members how to research and how to discern good research from bad research, these types of things. You know, again, practices on delivery, making sure that the information you're passing on is credible, is backed by evidence. We also do believe that there is a huge body of anecdotal evidence out there that is not necessarily recognized by the scientific community. And we feel that it's important to embrace that as well. I hope that answers the question.

Kirk: I think so,  I'm trying to think like I'm trying to think like a regulated health care professional. Right? I have to meet certain standards to be a registered nurse. I have to meet certain standards to offer an accredited program as an educator. So if I want to teach someone a business course, I have to demonstrate that I have a business background in order to teach it. So I'm approaching it. I'm definitely approaching it that way.

Shawna Dunbar: You know, to add to that, the next phase of our membership is our professional membership. And so we are working with health care providers, with other certified cannabis educators to develop a process of evaluation. So that process of evaluation includes, you know, testing to make sure that you are up to that standard. So I think that reflects a little bit more like, you know, the medical colleges that are out there, those, you know, demonstrating that you do have that level of knowledge, that level of experience. So we are developing and beta testing that right now. And we are working on we are the only association of Certified Cannabis Educators in the country and we are working on obtaining that accreditation ability to be that accreditation body or, you know, we're recognized by the government as an association. And so maybe that helps a little bit as well.

Jay Jay O'Brien: Yeah. And as far as the standards for membership go, just to put it real simply, like our community membership is for patients, the cannacurious. Anybody who doesn't have any kind of formal background in cannabis education. And then we have our leadership membership. So if you've taken some cannabis education courses, then the that's the membership for you and then a professional membership is just taking that to the next level. To put it plainly.

Kirk: Yeah, well I know and I find it fascinating and I and I completely respect what you're doing. I'm, I'm going through your web page right now. You've got the Cannabis Coaching Institute that's an American organization that is providing some of your member’s education.  I interviewed one of your members. That's Terese Browers. I think you've got I like what you've done. Is there anything you want our listeners to understand about your business? It is a business and what you're trying to do. What is there any questions I didn't ask you.

Jay Jay O'Brien: Would love to share a little bit about what Shawna and I are currently working on as part of our community membership offering. We've seen a lot of prevalence of cancer cases coming to us. So we are gearing our community membership currently to the cancer community, to anybody who has been diagnosed, either currently or previously, or caregivers of anybody who's been diagnosed. Our community membership offers monthly education. Access to our team of coaches and educators and guidance and support. We are building on with that. But really, we just want to provide a place where people with cancer can come to get guidance and support and education that they need. So we are currently building that and will be our first meeting will be in February. So we'll be sending out some information once we finalize details on that.

Kirk: Great. How big is your organization?

Jay Jay O'Brien: You're probably around 20, 25 members, paid members and volunteers.

Kirk: And they're all coaches.

Shawna Dunbar: Well, then we have so that that would be.

Jay Jay O'Brien: The membership.

Shawna Dunbar: Coaches with a small amount of community members. And then we also have all of our volunteers. So our board is made up of nine members. We also have subcommittee volunteers that join us. So we have a handful that that help us, you know, continue to get the work done. And then we also have an advisory committee, which is 20.

Jay Jay O'Brien: It pretty extensive.

Shawna Dunbar: It might be even more than that at this point. And our advisory committee members come from all different walks of life and levels of experience. So we have a patient. We have a lawyer. We have a pharmacist. We have, you know, different, different people with different levels of interest in the cannabis industry. And we turn to them for advice and guidance as well as to help us connect with other like minded organizations, like minded individuals. We also have our partnership. And I think when you were talking earlier about joining our organization, that might be really relevant to you as an organization, joining on as a partner. And we put those in place where we know that we are speaking the same language, we share the same beliefs, and we feel good about promoting our relationship. There is not generally money involved or anything in that. We are really nonprofit. We don't have much of a cash flow at this point, so our hours are all volunteer. We have no paid employees or anything. We are working towards that. But having, you know, grassroots organizations takes a little bit of time, especially in the cannabis space.

Kirk: Where I really like what you're doing. And as I said earlier, here I am, I'm a registered nurse, which I am limited in what I can do because I have a scope of practice. Ironically, the scope of practice allows me to do what I'm doing, and that is to be a cannabis educator. But if I want to move on and become a cannabis coach, as a registered nurse, I have to keep patient records, which becomes a very, very big barrier because now I've got seven years of storage and safekeeping and all that sort of stuff. So your cannabis coaches are a non-regulated group, but yet what you're trying to do is bring a standard so people can trust them.

Shawna Dunbar: Yeah, I'm in a similar position because I work in clinical practice. I work in a family practice. Actually. I'm sure that I'm the only cannabis educator in Canada doing that. It's a wonderful relationship. And so there I'm also required, you know, to help them with their charting and keeping their files and everything else. But yeah, there's, there's a lot of things that are sort of a gray zone for how we practice. And, you know, we want to respect people's privacy. So hanging on to, you know, charting and files and things like that, patients, you know, private information is not necessarily something that we want to be doing as coaches, but depending on the setting that you're working in, right for yourself, you know, keeping those files is important. For myself, it's the same thing. But, you know, at some point I chose in my practice that I only kept the files or, you know, accessible to me, not at the doctor's office. They always stay there, but accessible to me. I only keep them for the duration of my contract with my patients because that respects their privacy. And I think it protects me to a certain level as well. But these are things that we just need to talk about because it is an unregulated profession, you know, creating those standards as as we move forward.

Kirk: And what do you think, Trevor?

Trevor: It was great. It really was. So. Because at the end, I just want to make sure we sort of highlight their sort of membership levels because I thought that was kind of important. So anybody who has sort of has an interest in cannabis can become a community member. So that's like patients the cannacurious and people with no sort of formal cannabis training. Their leadership level, they've taken some cannabis training. So that's like cannabis coaches who have taken X, Y, Z, and they have a list of what they consider appropriate amounts of training. And then it sounds like they are working on and have a few people in what they call their professionals, so that be your health care professionals with some extra training. So, so it's nice that they have that tiered level, which which makes sense because different people will have different goals and what they want to learn. And, and I also thought it was really cool of, you know, not only with Jay Jay's story, but so many others, like even you and I did a talk at the senior center a little while ago and what comes out? Cancer patients and cannabis. So they seem to be rolling out a current program to reach out to cancer patients and cancer caregivers, specifically around cannabis. And I thought that was very cool as well.

Kirk: Yeah. I'm also on their web page and what I like about this, what I like about this story and I would like to I got to dig deeper. I once again though, there are two stories within this that I'd like to get another episode on. You know, learn a little bit about cancer and how, you know, Jay Jay is a cancer survivor and cannabis is a big part of it. There's a story there, but just but the story of their organization. What I like about that story is that it's really grassroots, and I'd like to get a little bit deeper into what they're doing for standards. I wasn't kidding. In my past life, I was very much involved with curriculum development and accreditation programs. You know how colleges get their programs accredited, how hospitals get accredited. I've been actively involved in both of those processes. I've written curriculum from scratch. I was involved with writing curriculum for Alberta back in the day for the paramedics, and I was also involved with the national curriculum for paramedics. And again, this is another life Trevor. But, but this, those experiences I'm applying to this, this program. And what I like about this is this is very much grassroots to say to say that you want to be the go to place. I mean, their mission, their mission is to provide the highest standard of education. Responsible cannabis education. You know, that's lofty. But I guess the question becomes is eventually you have to prove it. And I think as a grassroots organization, I think they're going to be able to improve it and I think it's going to grow. I think you and I need to talk about joining these guys as maybe as partners, because I think we fit right into their mission. We I consider ourselves an educational podcast and they don't have a member there Trevor. So maybe we should consider that.

Trevor: I think it sounds like a good fit to me as well.

Kirk: It just kills me that, that there's not there's not more regulated health professionals doing this.

Trevor: And we've talked about before, but you know, for better or worse, all of our colleges, the people who sort of regulate us, basically are afraid of cannabis. You know, we've talked about reasons before, yada, yada. But, you know, the Physicians' College, Pharmacists' college. The Nurses' College. They seem to be genuinely scared of cannabis and really, really cautious about their minions being involved. So for whatever the reasons that health care professionals are slow into the cannabis space, I give people like EduCanNation credit for seeing a need. Like, has been said so often on this show and other places. You know, you have a 75 year old who thinks cannabis might help with X and even if the doc says, yeah, go ahead, the whole now what? Like, you know, in my regular life. Well, the doc says, you know, yes, I think this inhaler will be good for you. What the now what is or how do I use it out. You know Doc might doc might say how many times Doc might not say how many times, but hold the nitty gritty of how you get the medication into you is actually not so straightforward. So that's why you have people like pharmacists who, you know, show you how to use it, tell you when to use it, tell you to rinse your mouth after using it. You know, not exact parallels, but, you know, that education part is definitely missing in the medical cannabis end of things. And these guys are filling the void that's obviously there because, well, one of the reasons health care professionals are not there.

Kirk: All right, Trevor. Well.

Trevor: I think we got Segway, though, right?

Kirk: That's right. We do. Pardon me. You are correct.

Trevor: Kirk, you have a My Cannabis Story this week.

Kirk: I have a My Cannabis Story this week Trevor. Thank you for reminding me. Yes, I went for a walk to the local Delta9 store and met up with a budtender and talked to I talked to some customers, talked to the manager. I got to get him a poster. I got to get him a Reefer Medness poster. But the gentleman I was talking to, he was what, six months? Yeah. And I just ask him to give me a cannabis story, and he got into his cannabis story. So here it is.

Trevor: Let's hear from Destry

Destry Cousins My name is Destry Cousins. I work here at Delta9 in Dauphin, Manitoba. I've been a budtender now since midway through June. As for maybe six months now. Five six months. I've been a cannabis user for nearly 20 years myself. I really enjoyed when everything switched to legalization and we like to expand and start introducing a lot of other people to the benefits of cannabis as well. One of my favorite things about working here has been having people come in, especially those particular especially with the older people, the people who really used to look at it as a negative, and now they come in and they've experienced some of the products and have found the benefits with them. I it's just it brings a lot of warmth and joy to me. Just see how cannabis has gone from just that, that crazy reefer that people smoked to being a really beneficial product for everyone.

Kirk: So that's interesting. As a bud tender, though, you're discouraged from letting people know the benefits of cannabis. So. So how do you do that? By following.

Destry Cousins So you're correct. We're not allowed to say, hey, this is going to be, you know, medically beneficial for this regard or this is going to benefit you in this way because we're not medical professionals. We're not allowed to say, you know, for certain. What we are allowed to do is say that current studies and current research has shown that there may be benefits in this regard with this product that you're looking to try. However, you should always consult with the physician, right? Talk to your doctor and look at the pros and cons before making that decision yourself. But we do like to give people the information that this is a possibility. And if you would like to experience that or if you like to explore that possibility, then yes, speak with your doctor, see what they say, maybe do a little bit of self research as well, and then come back to us.

Kirk: So you were saying off camera to me that you're starting to carry a lot of gels and a lot of, I guess what we call edibles, right? Yeah. So, so, so how does that work? Do you find that people are using the gel caps for recreation or do you find that they're coming here for different purposes?

Destry Cousins There are a few of our customers that come in, take the gel caps for recreational purposes because some of our gel caps are just THC.

Kirk: Right.

Destry Cousins So they're going to get you high. Some of them are really low THC levels and they're just minor cannabinoids. And they've yeah, a lot of people have come in, they've tried them. They see, hey, this is really helping with my issues. So I'm going to continue doing that. And they like the gel caps or the oils or the sprays or even like the gummies and things like that, because it's different than just smoking flower.

Kirk: Okay.

Destry Cousins You don't have to inhale it. You don't have that lingering scent in everything that, you know, a lot of people don't like. So things like that. Allot of the edibles and things like that or even just the topicals, they I find that they're becoming really popular.

Kirk: Okay. And what, minor cannabinoids are popular right now?

Destry Cousins Right now, the big ones are always going to be the biggest one is always going to be CBD.

Kirk: Okay.

Destry Cousins A lot of people will already know the benefit of CBD for that pain relief kind of thing, right. And it's huge. I think on if I were to go through most of our stuff is going to be CBD based primarily. CBN. A lot of people are finding for sleep. That one's starting to kick off and become more popular. The CBG is another one that we have a lot in stock. But I wouldn't say it has really caught on as much as the first two. To the CBG and CBN are like, I would say definitely are most popular right now for people.

Kirk: And what else? What else is popular?

Destry Cousins I think some of our other ones here. The THCV and the CBC. Again, we have a few products with those in it right now.

Kirk: Okay.

Destry Cousins And there's slowly kind of gaining popularity. But as an overall, they they're still pretty new to a lot of people.

Kirk: Sure.

Destry Cousins Even a lot of bud tenders.

Kirk: Yeah, yeah.

Destry Cousins So as more information comes out, as more research is done and more things are, you know, put out for the public, then we expand that knowledge onto our customer base as well.

Kirk: I guess I see you have a customer one other question. What's the most popular item? Flower? Edibles? Cookies?

Destry Cousins Pre-rolls.

Kirk: Pre-rolls.

Destry Cousins The Pre-rolls are the most popular. People come in, they just want to, you know, maybe go home and smoke a joint. The can

Customer 1: They don't know how to roll them.

Destry Cousins Yeah, exactly.

Kirk: I'm recording this. Is that okay? Thats alright. I'm recording it for our podcast. So. Al Right.

Destry Cousins Yeah. So people come in and, you know, they want me to just one pre-roll or they get a whole pack because not everyone is a really, you know, heavy smoker. And so I'm just having a pack of pre-rolls that last a week or something.

Kirk: Okay. That's popular.

Destry Cousins Yeah, definitely. Most popular is the pre-roll section.

Trevor: I like that. You know, a very upbeat guy, really willing to share. Speaking of education. Willing to share his knowledge, you know, being been good and proper, knows where his line is legally. You know what he can and can't say. But, you know, if people have questions, he's within his we'll call it within his scope, within his boundaries. He's more than happy to tell people about stuff. You know, if they did have some questions about the minor cannabinoids, he seemed to be relatively knowledgeable. So, no, that was that was a great chat.

Kirk: Yeah. And I guess that's one of the reasons why I thought this was a compelling cannabis story to fit into the EduCanNation story is because, again, it's all about education, right? So we know that Bud tenders across the nation are educating people about cannabis because their employers are ensuring they know their product. I mean, it's like seeing Danny at the liquor store. Danny knows his whiskeys, right? So Bud Tenders should know there should know their weed. And but the question is, as Shawna Jay Jay  and their compadres, Stacy and Stephanie are asking the question, what standards are we all following? So here's a group that's trying to set the standard, you know, so I thought it blended in well, because that's the question is like, you know, you're an unregulated health educator. By what standard? And here we go. We've got people out there trying to build standards.

Trevor: So I think that wraps it up nicely.

Kirk: Hey,.

Trevor: So as per usual, I'm Trevor Shewfelt I am the pharmacist.

Kirk: Kirk Nyquist. I'm the registered nurse and we are Reefer Medness. -The Podcast.

Trevor: Go visit our website @reefermed.ca. You can see show notes, you can see transcripts, you can see papers, you can see some pictures.

Kirk: Opinions.

Trevor: You can see some of Kirk's rants,.

Kirk: My rants.

Trevor: I said rants, opinions depends on the day, but I'll go check that all out. And if you like it, let us know. I think that's it for me.

Kirk: All right. Another good one, buddy.