New Marijuana Resources for Health Care Providers

Only 40% of health care providers surveyed reported feeling knowledgeable about the risks of marijuana use during adolescence. In order to help increase their comfort and knowledge of the marijuana laws and research on the health risks, CDPHE recently developed the Marijuana Pediatric Exposure Prevention Guidance for Health Care Providers. The two new pediatric guidance documents are titled Marijuana Pediatric Exposure Prevention Guidance for Health Care Providers:

Discussions with Parents or Guardians of Children and Adolescents Ages 0-20

Discussions with Children and Adolescents Ages 9-20



These documents provide evidenced-based guidance for Colorado health care providers to talk with patients and their parents about marijuana. Topics within the guidance documents include screening questions, health effects, secondhand smoke, parenting and safety (including safe sleep), and safe storage.

The guidance was developed using the information from the systematic literature review conducted by the Retail Marijuana Public Health Advisory Committee. A committee of experts developed guidance document content with additional feedback from health care provider focus groups.

CDPHE also developed factsheets for patients to accompany the guidelines, written at a middle school reading level and translated into multiple languages:

Youth and Marijuana Tips for Parents

These factsheets provide information for youth and parents about the risk of marijuana use including health effects, legal issues, safety, and available resources. The factsheets have space on the back for local agencies to place their logo and contact information, if desired.

For more information on the resources for health care providers and patients, go to http://bit.ly/CDPHE_MJ_HealthCareGuidance.