A new version of a medical cannabis bill under consideration by state lawmakers strikes a requirement that patients undergo criminal background checks and fleshes out protections for pharmacists and physicians involved in dispensing the drug, considered illegal under federal law.

But the revised legislation, released Monday evening, preserves the basic structure of the proposal pitched by medical marijuana advocates, Proposition 2 opponents and state officials last month.

“The big concepts have remained, but we’ve found more artful ways to address the small-to-medium issues based on a ton of input,” said Connor Boyack, founder of the libertarian Libertas Institute and a medical marijuana advocate.

The list of ailments — including HIV, cancer, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and forms of chronic pain — that could be treated with medical cannabis has remained virtually untouched. So have the allowable cannabis product varieties and the proposed distribution system.

Under both the original and updated versions, a state-centralized pharmacy would ship cannabis orders to local health departments for pickup by patients. A handful of private “cannabis pharmacies” would also sell the substance.

The drafted Utah Medical Cannabis Act took shape during weeks of private negotiations between groups on opposing sides of the Prop 2 debate. While the two camps still disagree on the medical cannabis ballot initiative, they found common ground on the proposed legislation.

Gov. Gary Herbert has pledged to call a special session on the bill, potentially drawing lawmakers to the State Capitol in mid-November or early December.

In recent weeks, participants in the negotiations have continued fine tuning the language of the bill made public in early October.

Greg Hartley, chief of staff for Utah House Speaker Greg Hughes, said officials wanted to share the updates before the Election Day decision on Prop 2.

“We did our best to get as many big changes in a draft bill form prior to the election so we aren’t accused of waiting for the outcome to determine what is in the bill,” he wrote in a text message. “That said, there are still some additional items we are working through and we expect to continue discussing other suggestions as they come to us. This bill isn’t final, but the framework of the compromise should remain consistent.”

Here are some differences between the original draft and the update posted online Monday: