Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1442004
31 cannapatientcare.com december 2021 | cannabis patient care feature between his own life and what's happened with cannabis in the U.S., from being born in 1970, the year Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act, to graduating West Point the year the first state medical law was passed. A native Californian, Scattini decided to stay in Kansas City after he left the Army because he saw an opportunity to affect the situation in Missouri, which is home to more than 450,000 veterans. Eleven months later, the state's voters approved Amendment 2, enacting a medical cannabis program Scattini calls the best in the nation. Now he is pushing to make Kansas City a leading center for medical cannabis research in the U.S., meeting regularly with the mayor's of f ice about how blighted urban area can be revitalized by welcoming research, manufac turing, and dispensaries. He's found allies in other West Point grads working in the Mayor's of f ice, and he's lobbying the Veter- ans Administration and the VFW to suppor t more research and access for veterans. "Cannabis can be an alternative to the methods we have been using to treat the injuries of combat," he says. "It can help alleviate not just suicides and overdoses but the prob- lems veterans face with education, employment, homeless- ness and addiction." The day after Missouri passed its medical cannabis initia- tive, Scattini created Cavalry Cannabis, the first of two canna- bis companies he has now founded. "Reconnaissance is the cavalry's mission, and as the nation expanded, it was cavalry scouts from Ft. Leavenworth who would escort settlers West," he says. "We're on a new frontier of medicine, and veterans should be part of leading the way." He's now in the process of pursuing a license for a fully in- tegrated facility for research and development that he hopes will attract support from the VA and Department of Defense. His Harvest 360 Tech project is using analytics to create 3D maps of cannabis for therapeutic applications. He has also been working on The Athena Protocol a strategy to mitigate and treat Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), what he describes as his passion project. "I had a platoon leader die from the effects of a head in- jury after five weeks," he says. "Losing him was really painful for me. I'm convinced immediate treatment with cannabinoids might have saved him." Scattini is also convinced that Kansas City has the potential to be the leader for medical cannabis in the U.S. "We're in the geographic center of the country, we have so many veterans and services for them here, and we have the city government completely on board," Scattini says. "We're working with them to rebuild the infrastructure of the past to become a city of the future -- something they can be very proud of." Editor's Note These profiles were previously published by Americans for Safe Access in their October 2020 and February 2019 ASA Activist Newsletter. To see the original newsletters, please visit https:// www.safeaccessnow.org/asa_activist_newsletter_october_2020 and https://www.safeaccessnow.org/asa_activist_newsletter_ february_2019. About the Author WILLIAM DOLPHIN produces Americans for Safe Access's (ASA's) monthly Activist Newsletter and has been part of ASA's communications team since 2002. He is the co-author of The Medicalization of Marijuana: Legitimacy, Stigma, and the Patient Experience, an award-winning book of medical sociology, and has published hundreds of articles on canna- bis and other topics. He has taught at a number of colleges and universities, including UC Berkeley, and is currently working on a book about cannabis use and mental health. Todd Scattini