Matthew Myro Rothman, Chief Science Officer, CannaLnx – Interview Series

As more states legalize medicinal cannabis and existing markets continue to mature, there is a growing need for a centralized hub that connects patients with care providers and dispensaries. Beyond just access, patients also require an intuitive way to identify the specific products that will best serve their needs. Fortunately, that solution has arrived. To discuss this technology and how it empowers medical cannabis patients, mycannabis.com spoke with Matthew Myro Rothman, Chief Science Officer of CannaLnx.

It sounds like you had quite a worldly experience while obtaining your degrees. What were the most impactful courses you studied at Cleveland State and the California Institute of Integral Studies, and where were some interesting places you studied abroad?

At Cleveland State, I took a course called Personal Transformation with Dr. James Royster that completely changed my trajectory. That class introduced me to the writings of Rumi, Ken Wilber and Carl Jung, and it directly led me to choose the California Institute of Integral Studies for graduate school.

At CIIS, genuinely every class I took in the Philosophy, Cosmology and Consciousness program was impactful. Some standouts included Krishna, Buddha, Christ, which compared the lives and influence of those three figures, and Brian Swimme’s The Universe Story. I also spent a semester studying philosophy abroad in Thessaloniki, Greece, which was a formative experience.

How did you first become involved in cannabis, and how different was working in the California medical cannabis scene long before recreational legalization?

During my second year of graduate school in 2004, a woman pursuing her Ph.D. in the same program approached me and offered me a job at her small nursery producing clones. At that time, the entire California medical cannabis market existed in a legal gray zone.

I joined a co-op of growers where we shared credentials to ensure our plant counts stayed within state guidelines. There were no state cultivation licenses back then, and the industry functioned almost entirely on trust, shared responsibility and community accountability.

As someone who worked with clones, how did you ensure they were as healthy as possible for your clients?

Every clone was fully rooted before it ever went to a dispensary for sale. We also maintained mother plants on a three- to four-month rotational life cycle to mimic their natural flowering rhythm in nature, which helped limit genetic drift.

We only used natural pesticides and fungicides, prioritizing plant health, genetic stability and overall quality.

What caught your professional attention about working with EM2P2, and why is the company’s work useful on a larger scale?

From the beginning, EM2P2’s mission has been to treat cannabis as medicine. The company is building the infrastructure necessary to ensure safe access, affordability and education, while also creating space for thoughtful, evidence-based reform across the industry.

Why was the CannaLnx system created, and from a technological standpoint, what went into the platform’s creation? How would you describe the process of achieving HIPAA compliance?

CannaLnx was created to serve as the single platform linking physicians, patients, dispensaries, laboratories and third-party administrators that design benefit packages for traditional healthcare. To build it, we first had to understand how pharmaceutical healthcare systems operate and then mirror that functionality within CannaLnx.

The platform was coded from the ground up with proprietary architecture, allowing for unlimited scalability, modification and innovation. HIPAA compliance is not a one-time milestone — it’s an ongoing process. To initially achieve compliance, we ensured that all personal health information is encrypted both at rest and in transit.

Every team member is required to register their devices, maintain current system updates and avoid public Wi-Fi access. We all undergo HIPAA training, and that education is continuous to meet evolving standards and protect patient data.

How does the CannaLnx platform help medical cannabis patients find the care they need?

CannaLnx partners with physician groups that prioritize education and compassion, not recommendation mills that hand out approvals indiscriminately. We’ve also brought dispensaries into our Network that emphasize patient care and employee education.

Through a simple search function, members can easily locate nearby Network physicians and dispensaries. We’ve also partnered with The Green Nurse and Holistic Caring, because nurses have greater freedom than physicians to provide detailed cannabis coaching. Doctors risk their DEA licenses if they get too specific with a Schedule I substance, while nurses do not face the same restrictions.

In addition, members have access to a growing library of articles and podcasts covering the latest research and medical efficacy of cannabis, empowering patients to educate themselves.

On the retail side, how does CannaLnx help dispensaries better engage with medical patients and guide product selection?

CannaLnx allows patients to track dispensary purchases and rate product efficacy through brief surveys tied to their condition, method of administration, dosage and perceived effect. This helps create a more educated patient population that isn’t solely reliant on budtender recommendations.

Where available, patients can also access certificates of analysis from lab testing to better understand the cannabinoids and terpenes that work best for their individual endocannabinoid systems. Because dispensary inventories change frequently, understanding molecular profiles helps patients make informed decisions even when their preferred products aren’t available.

How many episodes of the Edge of Cannabis Medicine podcast have you recorded, and who have been the most notable or insightful guests?

We’ve recorded 44 episodes over the past two years. One of the most insightful guests was Uwe Blesching, author of The Cannabis Health Index and founder of CannaKeys. The most notable — and arguably most controversial — guest was Adam Bierman of MedMen fame.

How do you hope CannaLnx will both streamline and normalize the process of seeking and using medical cannabis?

For the first time in U.S. history, reimbursement benefits are available for medical cannabis purchases, and CannaLnx is the only platform validating those purchases through third-party administrators. Embedding reimbursement into traditional healthcare plans from providers like Cigna and Blue Cross Blue Shield dramatically reduces stigma and expands affordability.

CannaLnx mirrors the healthcare experience people already understand, bringing all medical cannabis needs — from plant medicine to ancillary products — into one free, simple and unified platform.

How might the platform evolve as the cannabis industry changes, particularly if rescheduling occurs?

Because every line of CannaLnx code is proprietary, we can expand in any direction the industry — or policy — requires. We’ve already built a Reddit-style forum called CannXtions, where patients and doctors share insights and experiences. Our goal is to evolve this into a dedicated, elegant social platform for cannabis medicine patients.

We’re also enhancing our product-survey tools to make them more engaging, which allows us to collect large volumes of anonymized anecdotal data that can inform future research, especially as rescheduling opens new doors. Ultimately, CannaLnx becomes the only HIPAA-compliant electronic medical record for cannabis medicine.

That enables the future integration of traditional EMRs, like MyChart, with cannabis-specific records, giving physicians a complete view of what is actually working for their patients.

Also looking ahead, we’re preparing to roll out CannaHealth in Q2, a new feature within the CannaLnx platform designed to help patients and doctors better understand how cannabis functions as a wellness and therapeutic tool. CannaHealth allows members to track biometric and self-reported health data alongside cannabis use in a fully HIPAA-compliant environment, giving both patients and clinicians clearer insight into real-world outcomes. As rescheduling opens the door to more research and integration, tools like CannaHealth help bridge lived patient experience with clinical understanding.

Thank you for joining us, Matthew! Readers wanting more information should visit CannaLnx.