VIDEO: Khiron Life Sciences Corp (CVE:KHRN) Latin American Medical Cannabis Advances

Khiron Life Sciences Corp (CVE:KHRN) (OTCMKTS:KHRNF) Medical Director Dr. Maria Arboleda shares the company’s three-pronged approach to the medical cannabis space in Colombia specifically and, more broadly, Latin American. Dr. Arboleda discusses Khiron’s role in training doctors in Latin America on the value of medical cannabis. Khiron is also developing specialized cannabis clinics based on the Canadian model but adapted to the specific needs and cultural beliefs of Colombians. Khiron plans to develop Colombian-based cannabis research to meet the information and research requirements of Invima, a national drug and food monitoring agency. This approach positions Khiron competitively in the region’s medical cannabis space, which it estimates at 48 million patients in Colombia and 620 million patients in Latin America.

Transcript:

James West:   You’re Dr. Maria Arboleda, you’re the Medical Director of Khiron?

Maria Arboleda:    Right.

James West:   And so tell me about your role; what is that going to, what is your role going to be?

Maria Arboleda:    I can tell you a little bit about my background, and then I can explain what my role is?

James West:   Sure, perfect.

Maria Arboleda:    Yes. So I’m a proud Colombian, as you are seeing, and, well, I did med school in Colombia, then I moved to Mexico City. I was there for around six years.

Ed Milewski:  Did you have a specialty in medicine?

Maria Arboleda:    I’m an anesthesiologist and I’m a pain and palliative care physician.

Ed Milewski:  So that’s the connection with –

Maria Arboleda:    So then I came to Canada, to Montreal. I was at McGill University. I came to do a fellowship.

Ed Milewski:  Yeah, your English is unbelievable.

Maria Arboleda:    No, thank you, no…

James West:   It’s better than Ed’s.

Maria Arboleda:    [laughter] We can speak in French if you want to.

Ed Milewski:  And way better than yours.

Maria Arboleda:    Anyway, I’m just joking. Yeah, so I was at McGill for two years, two years and a little bit more, and that’s where I got involved in all this medical cannabis research. I’ve been also working with this clinic in Montreal that is called Sante Cannabis, which is one of the leading specialized cannabis clinics in Canada. And that’s how I got, basically, involved in all this, not only medical cannabis program, where we see patients for different medical conditions, but also research. Research like clinical trials for patients of my line of research has been always towards advanced cancer patients, because of the palliative care background, and chronic pain patients.

James West:   I see.

Maria Arboleda:    So that’s how I met Khiron when I was up in Montreal, and that’s how I came – started first as a medical advisor, and now as a Medical Director. So coming to your question regarding what is the role of the Medical Director in Khiron, it’s basically, I would say, I would divide it in three parts: first part is more regarding the training of my colleagues, training of doctors down in Latin America. As you can see, Khiron is a leading company right now not only in Colombia, but in Latin America from Mexico down to Chile, Argentina, etcetera. So we are committed to training of doctors.

We’re the only company right now that has the endorsement of four medical associations in Colombia. We have the endorsement and support of the Colombian Association of Neurology, Colombian Association of Internal Medicine, we’re working towards the Colombian Association of Pain and Palliative Care. So basically, that’s very important for us, as doctors, to receive some support from the medical associations. We go to medical conferences and we start training of doctors because, you know, in Khiron we’re working from the seed to the patient, right? And we’re not only happy to have a good quality product, but we also need to train doctors. If you have a good quality product and doctors don’t know how to prescribe…so that’s important, and that’s why we’re working on this training of doctors.

James West:   Okay.

Maria Arboleda:    Second part is the clinics, where we are developing specialized cannabis clinics from the experience that we have from the Canadian model and the Canadian experience, obviously adapting this to the Colombian reality, Latin American cultural beliefs.

Ed Milewski:  And you have formal relationships with the two main medical associations in Colombia? There’s been an announcement to that effect, right?

James West:   Yeah. She was just saying that they have four endorsements from the four medical associations in Colombia. The –

Maria Arboleda:    And the third part that you were saying, so the training, second part will be the clinics, and the third part will be the research, because we need to develop research with local patients and with local products in Colombia, right? I mean, you know that Israel and Canada are leading countries when we talk about research and all these development of research, Canada and Israel are leading that, but in Colombia, we have Invima, which is kind of the Health Canada entity; it’s obviously asking for local data from patients from Colombia with medical conditions in Colombia. So we’re starting also this research, development, with our own patients in our own clinics, and also with prestigious universities in Colombia to develop research with all these different medical conditions: epilepsy, chronic pain, dermatological conditions, etcetera.

James West:   Sure. What has been your experience thus far with using cannabinoids to treat palliatively, cancer patients with advanced cancer states?

Maria Arboleda:    Okay, that’s a great question. As I was saying, I was in Montreal; at this clinic we’ve seen more than 5,000 patients, so there is many, many different medical conditions. Of course, cancer, advanced cancer and palliative care is my, I’ll say strength, in that way. When we use medical cannabis for palliative care patients, what we’re trying to do, it’s important to understand that cannabis is not the miracle drug. Cannabis is an option, is a complement, or is an adjunct, to what the patient is receiving, right? So if a patient has terminal or advanced cancer or any palliative care condition, what we’re trying to do is helping the quality of life of those patients through symptom management.

For instance, if a patient has cancer and they have insomnia, they are not sleeping well, they have pain, they have anxiety, they have lack of appetite, nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy, etcetera, what we’re looking for is to treat those symptoms, to help them with those symptoms. So that’s what we’re using cannabis for. We’re not pretending that we’re gonna replace everything else, that cannabis is going to be, you know, a solution for all the problems a patient has, but at least is a complementary treatment that we can consider and that’s part of what we need to do in terms of training and educating our doctors, and educating our patients. Because if we don’t educate patients, well, that’s also an issue, right? We need to mitigate some expectations.

Our patients come into the office saying “Oh, I’m here because I want to get cured.” And unfortunately, we don’t have that evidence yet to say that cannabis can cure patients with cancer.

Ed Milewski:  Yeah, but it helps with pain, obviously.

Maria Arboleda:    It helps with the symptoms.

Ed Milewski:  And people that sometimes can’t eat, they can eat.

Maria Arboleda:    Exactly.

Ed Milewski:  I mean, it does do some things.

Maria Arboleda:    No, that’s what I mean, exactly. And in terms of quality of life of those patients, they’re having more appetite, they’re having less anxiety, they’re sleeping better, less pain, etcetera, etcetera. So if you are a patient dealing with all those symptoms, of course cannabis could be an option.

James West:   Sure. How many patients in Colombia do you think there are who are candidates to either participate in the research or to otherwise use cannabis for whatever medical condition?

Maria Arboleda:    So, so far we know, like, in Latin America, we say that we have around 620 million people that could benefit from medical cannabis, and specifically in Colombia, we’re talking about 48 million that could benefit from medical cannabis. Again, medical cannabis is not for everyone; there are specific indications and contraindications, and –

Ed Milewski:  So basically, when you say 620 million people, you’re talking South America?

Maria Arboleda:    No, Latin America. We’re talking from Mexico to Argentina, right? So

Ed Milewski:  Okay. So, Central America plus South America?

Maria Arboleda:    Plus Mexico, which is in North America.

Ed Milewski:  Right, right, right, okay.

Maria Arboleda:    So we have all these possibilities. Obviously Mexico is a huge market; as I was telling you, I lived in Mexico for around six years and I know also how the system works there, and I know obviously how the system works in Colombia. Even though we’re in Latin America, we’re different. So you know, we need to adapt all these Canadian model to Latin America, also adapting it to the cultural beliefs and adapting these to the needs of patients in Latin America.

James West:   Right. Okay, well, that’s great, Maria. Let’s – we’re going to leave it there for now and come back to you when you next visit Canada. We’re going to come and see you down in Latin America.

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Original article: VIDEO: Khiron Life Sciences Corp (CVE:KHRN) Latin American Medical Cannabis Advances

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