Have Doctors (Or Their Minions) Now Become Cops?

In bygone years, patient-physician confidentiality was sacrosanct. Just like husband and wife, priest and confessor, or lawyer and client relationships. Set in stone by the laws of the land. Not so anymore, at least in some pill rollers offices in Texas.

(PRWEB) September 21, 2003 --If you have been through the paperwork required to receive medical treatment lately, you noticed that you had to give information about relatives, without their effective consent, based on the logic that if there is a weakness” in the family genes, the government needs to know about it. The argument in favor of these intrusive questions is that it will help you and yours to get better medical treatment. Sure. If the insurance company can resist the monumental urge to cancel coverage on those family lines whose forms suggest a predisposition to heart disease or maybe cancer.

Now one can understand why the quacks would want to know about your nutrition. How much coffee, sugar and salt you consume could actually fall under a doctors purview, but how many amendments are shredded when you are required to fill out a government document which carries a penalty under law for false statements, and expects a patient to admit to the following:

Answer Yes or No:

1.   Sometimes I do not wear seatbelt when driving or riding in a car”

Sure. I moved it out of the garage to wash it and didnt bother with the belt. Now you have a confession. Send me a ticket.

2.   I will occasionally drive my car after having some beers or wine or other drinks.”

Are other drinks” Gatorade or V-8? Oh, and isnt it legal to drive as long as your blood alcohol is less than 0.08%? On the subject of law, here is a poser: If you mark yes” for the third consecutive time you are required to fill out this form, does that make you a felony DWI? A habitual violator? Surprise, surprise. Such a statement is in fact sufficient to get you adjudged as one. Tell a doctor you have abused alcohol or drugs and lose your pilot's license. It does not require multiple convictions to be punished as a habitual violator. Your admission is good enough. Go ahead. Fill out the form.

3.   I ride with people who have been smoking marijuana.”

That would be a NO. Since Im not a pothead, I dont ride with them… Im the designated driver.

4.   I do not have any smoke detector in the house.”

Now, I wouldnt say I didnt have any smoke detector in the house. Aside from being questionable English, the natural fact is that my ole yeller dog has a nose surpassed only by his voice. Safe as houses.

Now questions one through four above deal with violations of various statutes and ordinances, and it is prudent for one to avoid such conduct. On the other hand, requiring a written response (read that admission of guilt”) and attaching it to a permanent governmental record identified by ones Social Security number is unconscionable in a police station, much less in a doctor-patient relationship. And it gets worse! Question five asks:

5.   Do you keep a pistol or shotgun and ammunition in the house at all times?

Sure when theyre not on my hip, in an ankle holster or in the shotgun rack in the truck! Its legal. Just why does a clerk at the doctors office need to know where my guns are anyway? And rifles? The form does not mention rifles. I got a heap of them because they are way more lethal than pistols or scatterguns. Oh, did I mention they are legal and nobody elses business? And they are legal. Legal, I say.

6.   I do not have a special place to lock up my guns or ammunition.”

Well sure, theyre all in the big green gun safe. It weighs three hundred pounds, so maybe that high school girl making me fill out this form ought to warn her boyfriend that he needs to take a couple of helpers when he goes by to burgle my place, so he doesnt get a hernia and end up having to fill out one of these damned forms so he can get medical treatment. Yep, I really want to give this info to a clerk in a doctors office. And have it in a permanent government record.

And the last question on the form. The Coupe de Ville, ‘er coup de gras, The final chapter. Seven is a charm!

7.   Most of my friends have guns”

Sure. They need guns since theyre driving around with no seatbelts, drinking beer, wine and other drinks and smokin dope while en-route to the dump to throw away their smoke detectors. Since a lot of them are cops and the rest had to pass the same FBI check as a cop to carry a gun, Im sure that Bubba Lee and Billy Ray will be ecstatic to know that I stated on yet ANOTHER government permanent record that most of my friends have guns.” Ecstatic.

I guess Ill have to sell my guns and buy a murder-cycle. The form didnt ask if I sometime ride a motor cycle without a helmet.” I must infer from the absence of such a question, that such an activity would be viewed as prudent and safe conduct. Endorsed by the AMA and the guv-ment by default.

Of course there are two sides to every argument. Information like this was invaluable to the storm troopers of the Third Reich in about 1936, when it came time to start picking up all the guns….and Jews…and Gypsies…and Poles…and the physically and mentally handicapped. Yes, intrusive medical forms do have their uses.

It is time to treat forms like drugs. Just say no!
###