An appeals court Wednesday upheld an administrative law judge’s decision that the Florida Department of Health needed to go through a rule-making process before it could block medical marijuana operators from using third-party online sites to process patient orders.

A three-judge panel of the 1st District Court of Appeal agreed with Judge Suzanne Van Wyk that the department in 2021 improperly used an “unadopted rule” to prevent the use of the sites.

Van Wyk and the appeals court sided with Leafly Holdings, Inc., an online site that challenged the department.

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Wednesday’s opinion said patients could see available medical marijuana products on Leafly’s site and put them in online shopping carts.

Leafly would then communicate the orders to medical-marijuana operators, known as medical marijuana treatment centers, and alert patients when the orders were ready, according to the appeals court.

Patients would get their orders from medical marijuana treatment centers, which are licensed by the state.

In February 2021, the department issued a memo to medical marijuana treatment centers saying the online services violated a state law that bars the operators from contracting for services “directly related to the cultivation, processing and dispensing” of cannabis.

The appeals court Wednesday pointed to…