The first-ever national meeting on the medical use of marijuana gets underway today at the University of Iowa. Dr. Robert Block is a U-of-I professor of anesthesia and will be one of the lecturers at the Iowa City conference. He says it’s intended to be an educational conference that he hopes will be balanced to talk about the good and bad impacts of the drug.Dr. Block says there are many potential benefits to the medical use of marijuana, however, he would not say in so many words that he’d support pot being used on a broader scale.While there are many clear benefits in the medical use of marijuana, Dr. Block says his research focuses on the many negative effects it can have on mental abilities, among other problems. He says other research has proven that smoking marijuana can do some good.The First National Clinical Conference on Canabis Therapeutics will conclude tomorrow afternoon.