Teaching Team

Professor Kylie O’Brien PhD is an Adjunct Professor at Torrens University. She has a strong academic career in the fields of Chinese medicine, integrative medicine, and, since 2018, in medicinal cannabis. She has worked for the Victorian Department of Human Services, and held senior leadership roles in the university and private education sector. An internationally recognised expert in Chinese medicine and integrative medicine, she has published extensively, including a book on integrative oncology (US: Springer, 2017). Kylie’s second book, with co-author Dr Philip Blair, O’Brien K, Blair P, Medicinal Cannabis and CBD in Mental Healthcare, Springer, 2021 has now been published (Springer). She is a member of the Australian government’s Tertiary Education and Quality Standards Agency (TEQSA) Expert Panel and a previous member of the TGA Advisory Committee for Complementary Medicines.

Kylie has been leading doctor education on medicinal cannabis in Australia since 2018. Her courses were the first to receive RACGP Category 1 CPD accreditation. She also set up the pathway via the National Institute of Integrative Medicine Ethics Committee for doctors to apply to become authorised prescribers of medicinal cannabis under the TGA’s Authorised Prescriber Scheme.

Dr. Philip Blair, MD, (Colonel, US Army, retired) is a Family Physician and consultant in disease management in the Northwest USA. He graduated from West Point in 1972, attended the University of Miami School of Medicine, training as an Army Family Physician and serving as a combat physician in the first Gulf War. After medical assignments in three continents and 29 years in uniform, he retired from the Army and has been consulting on complex disease management since 2000.

Dr. Blair has been studying, treating, and lecturing about the human body’s natural endocannabinoid system (ECS) since 2014. His goal is to restore health and performance by enhancing the ECS using diet, exercise, appropriate medications and non-psychoactive therapies.

Elisabeth Mack, RN, BSN, MBA  founded Holistic Caring in 2016 to bridge the gap between traditional and cannabis medicine through education, guidance, and supportive care for patients with product choices, dosages, interactions and timing. 

Elisabeth is a provider for the California Board of Registered Nursing and authored a curriculum to train healthcare providers to have these conversations with patients, approaching cannabis by emphasizing holistic and functional medicine. 

Elisabeth’s background includes a decade in hospitals where she specialized in psychiatry and medicine.  Elisabeth spent the 20 years prior to Holistic Caring in operations and sales management of several health insurance carriers and believes cannabinoid medicines offer health and wholeness through patient empowerment.  

Elisabeth earned an MBA in Healthcare Administration, a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, and a Bachelor of Arts in psychology. She is a member of the Society of Cannabis Clinicians and serves on the Boards of the American Cannabis Nurses Association & Los Angeles NORML.

In 2018 Graham opened the first medical cannabis service in Aotearoa NZ. Cannabis Care Clinic is at 97 St Lukes Rd, Auckland providing specialist consultations for legal medicinal cannabis prescriptions. Problems addressed include chronic pain, cancer symptoms, anxiety, chronic insomnia and neurological conditions.

Most patients have experienced little benefit or adverse effects from conventional treatment or have been told there are no further treatments. Many report that medicinal cannabis offers symptom relief, improved quality of life and most importantly, restores hope. He has prescribed CBD to 1500 patients with very good outcomes. An audit of his first 400 CBD patients showed benefit for chronic pain and/or emotional distress: British Journal of General Practice Open, 5/2/20: https://bjgpopen.org/content/early/2020/02/03/bjgpopen20X101010

He was appointed to the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council for assessment of medicinal cannabis research projects in 2021.

His part time general practice experience dates from 1983. Much of this work involves assessing and managing addictions and/or chronic pain. He is a FRNZCGP. 

Graham completed his Fellowship of the Australasian Chapter of Addiction Medicine (FAChAM) in 2008. As an Addiction Specialist he manages problems such as alcohol and drug withdrawal, opioid substitution treatment, medication for chronic pain and he writes addiction assessments.

Associate Professor Genevieve Steiner is an NHMRC-ARC Dementia Research Development Fellow and Director of Research at the NICM Health Research Institute, Western Sydney University. Her cognitive neuroscience research spans the early detection, prevention, and treatment of cognitive decline in older people with the aim of reducing dementia risk and improving quality of life.

A/Prof Steiner’s current focus is on testing novel therapeutics that can provide early intervention for those at high risk of dementia, including a world-first medicinal cannabis trial for those with early-stage Alzheimer’s disease. A/Prof Steiner has attracted >$15M AUD in grant funding (>$6M as a CI), 19 awards and prizes, and has published >60 peer reviewed publications and presented at >40 international and national conferences.

Jeffrey Hergenrather is a general practitioner specializing in cannabis/cannabinoid medicine since 1999. His medical experience includes 26 years in emergency medicine and private general practice. His involvement in the field of cannabis medicine dates back to 1977 when as a GP physician he recommended cannabis for a variety of conditions to appreciate its remarkable pharmacological and psychological benefits with only trivial adverse effects. He continues in a cannabis consultation practice in northern California with face-to-face, telephone, and online consultations in the use of cannabis as medicine.

Dr. Hergenrather’s practice, research, and teaching focus on the medicinal use of cannabis through a wide range of conditions and age groups – from infants to end-of-life care. His current studies are focused on which cannabis varietals or chemovars may best treat a specific clinical conditions, including pain, cancer, glaucoma, and mood disorders. He has been an adjunct professor at Sonoma State University where he taught a Biology course in the Medical Use of Cannabis. He is a founding member and past-president of the Society of Cannabis Clinicians, a non-profit corporation dedicated to quality patient care, education, clinical studies, and physician practice standards. The SCC is the oldest organization of physicians specializing in the use of cannabis as medicine.

Dr Ali Seyfoddin is the Deputy Head of School of Science at Auckland University of Technology. Trained as a pharmacist, he leads the Drug Delivery Research Group (www.drugdelivery.aut.ac.nz) and his research interests are primarily pharmaceutical formulation, biological engineering and bioprospecting.

Being practically minded, he finds application for his research in natural drug discovery, nanoencapsulation, 3D- and bio-printing, aquaculture feed technology and medicinal cannabis (cultivation, processing, extraction and formulation). He also teaches a range of undergraduate and postgraduate courses related to pharmacology, biomedical sciences and medicinal cannabis science.

Dinesh Thapa is a cannabinoid research scientist currently accepted as a PhD student at Curtin University, Australia. He completed his MSc. pharmacology from Dalhousie University and worked as a research associate for 1.5 years at Professor Melanie Kelly’s lab. He investigated antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory effects of different cannabinoids (phytocannabinoids and synthetic cannabinoids) in ocular pain and inflammation while at Dalhousie university. He also worked for Panag Pharma (a cannabinoids research-based company situated in Nova Scotia, Canada). He then moved back to his home country Nepal to initiate his own research in cannabis and cannabinoids.

He is exploring ethnopharmacological uses of cannabis and studying the role of different cultivars in different diseases and people throughout Nepal. He is also working with different stakeholders and running campaign for legalization of cannabis in Nepal. As a registered pharmacist of Nepal, he is looking forward to collaborating with different health professionals worldwide to promote rational use of cannabinoids medicine for different diseases and illness. He loves to describe himself as a global citizen.

Dr. Lola Ohonba is the founder and CEO of WCI HEALTH LLC, an alternative health and wellness online store. She is a clinical pharmacist certified in medical cannabis. She is the host of the podcast “Let’s Talk About Medical Cannabis with Dr. O” on Apple Podcast, where she talks about the role of cannabis in the management of various disease states.

She is also the author of “A Pharmacist’s Guide to Cannabis: Perspectives of a non- conformist clinician” available on Amazon. She lives in Florida, loves to volunteer, travel, and listen to current affairs in her spare time. Dr. O is active on all the social media platforms and is accepting invites for collaboration, consultation and speaking engagement.

David Nutt is a psychiatrist and the Edmond J. Safra Professor of Neuropsychopharmacology in the Division of Brain Science, Imperial College London. He was previously President of the, European Brain Council, British Association of Psychopharmacology, British Neuroscience Association and European College of Neuropsychopharmacology.  He is currently Founding Chair of DrugScience.org.uk and holds visiting Professorships at the Open University and University of Maastricht. In 2013 he won the John Maddox Prize from Nature/Sense about Science for standing up for science and in 2017 a Doctor of Laws hon causa from the University of Bath.

Malcolm Lamont draws upon over 25 years of practical experience in the plant biotechnology industry. During this time Malcolm created advanced Tissue Culture based propagation systems and plant performance enhancement technologies which provide gains in key areas such as growth, resilience, yield, and quality; and hence deliver substantial commercial opportunities.

Malcolm has headed research teams for a number of International and Australian companies, with diverse backgrounds ranging from increasing growth rates in forestry trees, to developing biological and engineering solutions for carbon capture from coal fired power stations, and to the natural rehabilitation of mine sites and wastewater streams, during this time he has developed stringent procedures, protocols and breeding programs for several of the Industry Majors.

Over the last 5 years he has worked extensively in the medical cannabis industry and has seen first hand the problems faced with inconsistent product and poor producing cultivars. This has currently led him into the field as a Senior Consultant for medicinal cannabis companies worldwide, creating numerous strains of cultivars tailored to individual needs. Malcolm’s focus is developing true breeding medical cannabis and hemp varieties which will not cross pollinate will have highs levels of beneficial compounds. This will ensure a company’s product grown today will be the same as the product they grow in 10 years.

His vision is to make commercially viable solutions for marginal and degraded land.

Postgraduate in Endocannabinology and Cannabic Terapeutic.

Medical Director, ANANDAMED; Vice President, CANNAMERICA; Scientific Director, María Moñitos Foundation

Facundo has strong academic and clinical experience in the fields of integrative medicine, medical cannabis, and drug policy. After finishing his career as a clinically oriented physician, he decided to dedicate himself fully to clinical care and education based on natural substances, completing an internship in Drug Policy in 2017 and taking a leading role in the NGO Latinoamerica Reforma (Santiago de Chile). He completed the first postgraduate degree in Latin America in Endocannabinology and Cannabic Therapeutics at the National University of La Plata (UNLP) in 2017.

Due to the growing public demand for medical advice on cannabis, ANANDAMED was inaugurated at the beginning of 2018, one of the first institutes in the Latin America region dedicated exclusively to cannabis medical care. He co-founded CANNAMERICA in 2018, a Latin American organization aimed at promoting education and disseminating information on harm reduction and public policies with a focus on human rights. He is currently serving as its Vice President. At the beginning of 2020, he was appointed Scientific Director of the Maria Moñitos Foundation (Bogotá Colombia), where he is in charge of conducting education and research projects with several universities. He also joined the Advisory Board of the Society of Cannabis Clinicians, Latin America Chapter.

Facundo is an internationally recognised expert in Medical Cannabis, has presented on medicinal cannabis as well as drug policy and has participated in numerous panels in several Latin Americian countries. He currently participates as a teacher in educational platforms in Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, United States, Mexico and Peru, and conducts research in the área of public health policy.

Clint Werner is a cannabis advocate and activist living in San Francisco, California. He has degrees in journalism and theater and a Masters Degree in Library Science.

Clint became a medical marijuana activist and cannabis science researcher while caring for friends during the AIDS crisis. He wrote and published Marijuana Gateway to Health: How Cannabis Protects Us from Cancer and Alzheimer’s in 2011. 

RN(EC), NP-PHC, BScN, IIWCC
CEO Watson-Favaro Cannabis Consultants

My name is Bridget Watson-Favaro I am a Nurse Practitioner. I have worked with patients from all walks of life, pediatric to geriatric. I have worked in health care for 20 years, starting as a floor nurse and working my way up to Nurse manager and then to a Director of Care for a 160 bed long-term care home. As a Nurse Practitioner I worked for an Aboriginal Health Center and also travelled to multiple long term care homes and specialized in Wound Care. I have now been specializing in Medical Cannabis for close to 5 years now. I suffered with Chronic Pain secondary to Autoimmune disease along with Adult-Onset Epilepsy, this led me down a path of poly-pharmacy and struggling with little to no results from Western Medicine. I finally realized that I needed to find another path and followed Natural medicine and did a lot of courses and research into Medical Cannabis and eventually found a practitioner to authorize it for me and have been able to have life-changing results with medical cannabis and needed to get the word out to other people suffering like I had been. There is an alternative to what we as medical practitioners have been telling you. Medical Cannabis can Help! 

Medical cannabis expert and neurologist Professor Mike Barnes has dedicated the latter part of his career to medical cannabis excellence, education and clinical leadership.

A co-author of the All-Party Parliamentary Group report on the evidence for medical cannabis as part of its Drug Policy Reform and the first  adopter of medical cannabis as a treatment option in the UK, Mike shares his expertise and passion for the medical cannabis industry with international Governments, global cannabis organisations and specialist clinicians. He is dedicated to the development of an enduring domestic industry with trusted global partners and a sensible and robust approach to medical cannabis prescribing in the UK.

Dr Elisabeth Philipps PhD is a clinical neuroscientist and integrative medicine practitioner based in the UK. She runs a health consultancy specialising in nutritional neurology, the endocannabinoid system and phytocannabinoids including CBD and medicinal cannabis. Her focus includes translational research, clinical and industry education around the body’s endocannabinoid system and cannabinoid products focusing on brain health and injury. 

Dr Elisabeth has designed several cannabinoid products and consults for clinics and R&D businesses in the green pharma industry regarding cannabinoid research, regulation and product development. She regularly presents at international conferences and events, and is soight after by the national press and specialist healthcare publications for her expert opinion.

You can connect with Dr Elisabeth via www.drelisabethphilipps.com

Instagram @drelisabethphilipps
Twitter @drphilipps
LinkedIn Dr Elisabeth Philipps

Donald I. Abrams, MD. is a Professor Emeritus of Medicine at the University of California San Francisco. He has an Integrative Oncology consultation practice at the UCSF Osher Center for Integrative Medicine.

He received an A.B. in Molecular Biology from Brown University in 1972 and graduated from the Stanford University School of Medicine in 1977. After completing an Internal Medicine residency at the Kaiser Foundation Hospital in San Francisco, he became a fellow in Hematology/Oncology at the Cancer Research Institute of the University of California, San Francisco in 1980. He was one the original clinician/investigators to recognize and define many early AIDS-related conditions at San Francisco General Hospital where he also served as chief of Hematology-Oncology for 14 years.

He has long been interested in clinical trials of complementary and alternative medicine interventions for HIV/AIDS and cancer, including evaluations of medicinal cannabis. In 1997 he received funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to conduct a clinical trial on the short-term safety of cannabinoids in HIV infection. Subsequently he was granted funds by the University of California Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research to continue studies of the effectiveness of cannabis in a number of clinical conditions. He completed a placebo-controlled study of smoked cannabis in patients with painful HIV-related peripheral neuropathy as well as a study evaluating vaporization as a smokeless delivery system for medicinal cannabis. He conducted a NIDA-funded trial investigating the pharmacokinetic interaction between vaporized cannabis and opioid analgesics in patients with chronic pain.

His last study was an NIH-funded trial evaluating vaporized cannabis in patients with sickle cell disease. He co-authored the chapter on “Cannabinoids and Cancer” in the Oxford University Press Integrative Oncology text that he co-edited with Andrew Weil. He co-edits the NCI PDQ CAM Cannabinoids and Cancer website. He was a member of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s committee that published The Health Effects of Cannabis and Cannabinoids: Current State of Evidence and Recommendations for Research in January 2017.

Dr. Steven Salzman, Medical Director, has been a practicing trauma surgeon and trauma intensivist for over 20 years, and has unparalleled experience treating patients with sleep disorders and complex pain syndromes.

He has integral faculty involvement in resident and fellow education at hospitals where he is on staff, and sits on a number of philanthropic and outreach boards.

An experienced clinician, scientist and researcher, I have expertise in wound healing, clinical trials and the use of biochemical techniques to better understand neutraceuticals, particularly medicinal cannabis. In particular I have a passion for translation of research to point-of-care personalised patient management strategies to improve the lives of people living with chronic wounds

She currently holds positions at Releaf Clinics Australia, National Institute of Integrative Medicine, and Medical One Moonee Ponds where she has practiced since completing her training.

As an authorised prescriber of medicinal cannabis, Carolyn effectively and judiciously employs its use for appropriate health conditions as part of an integrative approach.

She is involved in mentoring and training doctors in medicinal cannabis prescribing and holds the position of Head of Clinical Services at Releaf Clinics.

Apart from her clinical roles, Carolyn is a regular speaker on a variety of health topics for both peers and the community, and is a competitive ironman triathlete.

Prof. Hinanit Koltai, PhD, is a Senior Research Scientist and the Director of Academic Affairs at the
Agricultural Research Organization, Volcani Center, Israel. She is a leading Author of more than 100
peer-reviewed publications and more than 30 book chapters and invited reviews and she holds 15
international patents. She is the Editor of books and a member of Editorial boards in international
scientific journals. She teaches plant development and medical cannabis courses in Bar Ilan
University, Israel.

Research in Koltai lab is focused on deciphering the “entourage effect”; between cannabis
compounds while specifying active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) from cannabis and their
medical activity at the physiological and molecular levels in human cells, 3D printed models and
human tissues. The lab combines state of the art chemistry and cellular and molecular biology tools,
making new discoveries in this field. Research results are IP protected; they are published in
international scientific journals and form a scientific basis for the development of what might
become the next generation of cannabis-based medical products and elite cannabis chemovars.

Judith Lacey is the Head of Supportive Care and Integrative Oncology at Chris O’Brien Lifehouse Comprehensive Cancer Centre (COBLH).  Her primary interest is in the development and integration of supportive care interventions that include evidence based complementary therapies, exercise and nutrition to keep people living well with cancer independent of prognosis or stage of disease. With over 20 years experience working in cancer care,  Judith provides holistic supportive care  to patient living with cancer with a focus on multidisciplinary integrative oncology, and whole person care. She works with a large team of dedicated health professionals and researchers to maximise patient wellbeing. 

Judith is dedicated to developing the integration of evidence based complementary medicine and holistic medical care into supportive care provision in comprehensive cancer services. She has taken on leadership roles in the clinical space, service development, research and education to develop this field  and currently Chris O’Brien Lifehouse is the most comprehensive Integrative oncology service in Australia. Judith is committed to innovation, research, education and has both national and international collaborations.  She very active in the rapidly growing area of medicinal cannabis research and education in cancer care as well as other research  fields  including: developing feasible model of holistic supportive care  for patients receiving immunotherapy, identifying patient needs and referral patterns to integrative oncology and supportive care services, PROMs in cancer care, exercise , mind-body therapies, and other integrative oncology research.

Daryl is a developmental-behavioural paediatrician at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne, Senior Research Fellow at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, and Associate Professor in the University of Melbourne Department of Paediatrics. His research interests include ADHD, psychopharmacology, models of care for children with developmental disorders, and inequalities in access to health services for children. In recent years he has developed a program of clinical trials into medicinal cannabis for paediatric disorders.

Dr. Mihindu Jayasuriya completed his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery at Deakin University (2017). He has since used his clinical experience and passion for cannabinoid medicine to transition to working at Releaf Clinics. Currently he holds the position of Chief Medical Officer (CMO) at Releaf Group Limited.

Professor Nicholas (Nick) Lintzeris is an Addiction Medicine specialist who has been involved for over three decades in clinical service delivery, research, professional education and policy activities in the Alcohol and other Drugs (AoD) field. He is internationally recognised as an expert in the treatment of opioid use disorder, and has clinical and research interests in cannabis and psychostimulant use.