Posted on 03/12/2011 8:24:19 AM PST by MedNole
This alert was recently sent out to the Florida Medical Association's members, presaging a special-interest free-for-all as it tussles with the NRA over its bill banning doctor inquiries about gun ownership.
Dear Colleagues,
As you have probably heard, there is legislation moving in the Florida Legislature, SB 432 and HB 155, which is a major intrusion into the patient-physician relationship. These bills place the government in the middle of the relationship between doctors and our patients by regulating what questions physicians can ask during a private medical examination. This legislation criminalizes doctors who ask their patients about gun ownership to ascertain accurate and complete patient history as well as advise patients on gun safety. The bill also prohibits physicians from discharging a patient from his or her practice based on the patient’s refusal to answer a question. This is an inappropriate intrusion of government into the bond that exists between doctors and their patients. The FMA is adamantly opposed to these bills.
We urge you to contact your hometown legislators today and tell them that physicians strongly oppose SB 432 and HB 155 because it puts the government in the middle of the private relationship between physicians and their patients. At a time when we are facing a physician shortage and competing with other states to retain and attract physicians, HB 155 sends the wrong message. This legislation, if passed, would make Florida the only state in the nation to pass such an extreme measure and would send the message to doctors all over the country that Florida is an unfriendly place to practice medicine.
(Excerpt) Read more at tampabay.com ...
1% of what you do as a physician has to do with patient care; 99% has to do with keeping the lawyers at bay.
What about the other scenarios I posited?
The American Association of Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), born as an alternative to the hard left AMA is a conservative organization. The AAP is probably further left than the AMA as a whole.
LOL!!
I don’t agree with it, but it is the way the system is set up at the present time. I don’t ask all my patients whether they have firearms at home, only ones who I’m worried are crazy. Never ask any peds patients that question - but then, I’m not bound by the standard of care cooked up by the AAP since I’m not a pediatrician.
When the day comes that I’m required to ask everyone about guns and collect information for the state about church attendance etc so that the left can subjugate the citizens of America, I’ll quit practicing.
Are you a psychiatrist too?
And that is the part I do not like or agree with. Those records will one day be available to the Government. (if they aren't already)
Thanks for the enlightenment.
Neither suicide nor homicide are firearms problems, they are mental health and LE issues. Both existed before the invention of simple projectile launching devices. As for children accessing dangerous objects - firearms are one of a list of dangerous objects - parents have been childproofing the environment against hazards throughout human history.
This is simply and purely an antigun ploy hiding behind some supposed responsibility of physicians.
I find it easier to lie to the questioner than to replace them. After all House MD has said many times “Everyone Lies”.
And that is a sad state of affairs...
Taken at face value, that is a very misleading statement. Yes it's true but many more children die in accidental drownings, vehicle accidents, fires, falls, sporting incidents, and such then do from firearm misadventures. If you were to rank the type of "accident" by frequency, it would become obvious that firearms are a relatively minor cause of incident. Last time I looked drownings were one of the major causes of child death, including cases of toddlers drowning in mop buckets (sad but true).
On the topic, my opinion is that the bill is an overreach and is not necessary. If your doctor wants to ask questions that you disapprove of, change doctors.
Regards,
GtG
It's not to find out how you store your guns but whether or not you own any guns IIRC. My answer to my own doctor when I was asked if I owned any guns a few years ago was "it's not any of your business whether or not I own guns and don't ever ask that kind of a question of me ever again as you are not my psychiatrist" or words to that effect. And that was the end of that.
When I was growing up back in the 50's and 60's we had a saying to the effect, "your rights end when they start to intrude upon my rights". Not trying to be difficult here Doc but I have a privacy right that as a doctor you must respect no matter whether you like it or not.
I routinely get asked that question as well when I usually visit my primary doctor. And as usual I answer no as I too realize as you do what an affirmative reply means no matter how I'm feeling one way or the other.
What a crock of BS information...It is the federal & state governments that started the Dr's asking the questions to begin with back in the late 90's...
When my youngest grandchild was born (MD - 2000), 3-minutes after my daughter got to the recovery room a nurse arrived with a 3-page questionnaire that included asking whether my daughter and son-in-law or any other members of their family owned guns...She told the nurse NOYB...
Right, cause only leftist doctor groups like the AMA and fake doctor groups like the PRCM should intrude in the doctor-patient relationship. Anyone conservative doing so would be wrong.
And If I recall,children are more likely to die from a whole list of other cause than guns;only the politically dishonest government and anti-gun groups count teenage gang members killed in drug gang activities as "child victims of gun violence".
>Are we that weak as gun owners that we don’t have courage and we need help from the government to solve this non-issue??
Sometimes it seems like it.
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