Standing Wolf
Member in memoriam
In exactly two words: new doctor.
Pediatrician nonsense
- Thread starter LJWebster1
- Start date
- Status
Many pediatricians do follow their associations anti-gun stance, just as other professionals do.
Anyhow, John Wayne participated in both the hunting and shooting sports, or at least that's what he wrote on his OSS application (which I have seen in person).
http://www.archives.gov/press/press-kits/american-originals-photos/john-wayne-oss-11.jpg
Anyhow, John Wayne participated in both the hunting and shooting sports, or at least that's what he wrote on his OSS application (which I have seen in person).
http://www.archives.gov/press/press-kits/american-originals-photos/john-wayne-oss-11.jpg
First off, where is the quote button so if I want to quote a post in a reply, i can just click it and that poster's message will show up automatically inbetween the quote brackets?
Second,
Yes, this is true, but it also varies by age. You should never leave your guns around where your children can get to them IMHO. However, 9+, or maybe a little older, and yes, you CAN trust your kid to start using his cognative functions, even if it is only 'this is dad's rule, i better obey'.
oprah or some show did a bit when they told kids 'if you see a gun don't touch, get an adult' and tested some kids. 2 kids were from the same progun home, the 6 year old fell to tempation but the 10 year old did not (or possibly vice versa)
James T Thomas
Member
mindgames
Not only the AMA, AAP, but the Psychological Associations are also attempting to intwine social control by the various Psych. "evaluations and classification" testing which has become mandatory for school children.
Don't believe it? How about you posters with the Psych. degrees?
Are not children being asked similar questions about the presence of firearms in the home, posession of guns by dad and mom, etc., as part of these questionaires?
Cannot, these children be classified as troubled,agressive, depressed, or whatever medical term sounding professional, and then be sidetracked by the system, to be it's victim, and controled by it for the remainder of their lives? Even into adulthood?
The Pediatrician aspect of this socialism is only one small part.
And one of the "aims" is firearm posession.
And it's all for our own "good."
Not only the AMA, AAP, but the Psychological Associations are also attempting to intwine social control by the various Psych. "evaluations and classification" testing which has become mandatory for school children.
Don't believe it? How about you posters with the Psych. degrees?
Are not children being asked similar questions about the presence of firearms in the home, posession of guns by dad and mom, etc., as part of these questionaires?
Cannot, these children be classified as troubled,agressive, depressed, or whatever medical term sounding professional, and then be sidetracked by the system, to be it's victim, and controled by it for the remainder of their lives? Even into adulthood?
The Pediatrician aspect of this socialism is only one small part.
And one of the "aims" is firearm posession.
And it's all for our own "good."
PlayboyPenguin
member
Yes, age does play a factor. As children age they become more aware of causality and that some things cannot be undone. As for quote buttons, I do not have one. I used to but no more. I have heard others say this as well. they just disappeared for some people a week or so ago. 
The doctor is out of bounds
Boundary Violation:
Gun Politics in the Doctor’s Office
Timothy Wheeler, MD
Appeared originally in the Medical Sentinel of the
Association of American Physicians and Surgeons,
March/April 1999, pp. 60-61
Imagine this scenario: you visit your doctor for back pain. Your doctor
asks if you have firearms in your home. Then he announces that your
family would be better off (especially your children) if you had no guns
at all in your house. You leave the doctor’s office feeling uneasy,
wondering what guns have to do with your backache. Does your doctor care
about your family’s safety? Or instead, did he use your trust and his
authority to advance a political agenda?
American families may soon find themselves in this scenario. Social
activists are taking their war on gun ownership to a new battleground:
the doctor’s office. (1) The American Medical Association (AMA) (2),
American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) (3), and American College of
Physicians (ACP) (4) are urging doctors to probe their patients about
guns in their homes. They profess concern for patient safety. But their
ulterior motive is a political prejudice against guns and gun owners.
And that places their interventions into the area of unethical physician
conduct called boundary violations.
Doctor-patient sex is the most well-known and sensational example of a
boundary violation. More recent literature recognizes a wide variety of
nonsexual violations. (5) These cover such issues as finances,
confidentiality, and gratification of the doctor’s needs. Although
boundary violations were first addressed in the psychiatry literature,
it has become clear that they also occur in general medical practice.
(6)
Boundaries in the doctor-patient relationship derive naturally from the
relationship’s fiduciary nature. In general, "treatment boundaries can
be defined as the set of rules that establishes the professional
relationship as separate from other relationships and protects the
patient from harm. A patient who seeks medical or psychiatric treatment
is often in a uniquely dependent, anxious, vulnerable, and exploitable
state. In seeking help, patients assume positions of relative
powerlessness in which they expose their weaknesses, compromise their
dignity, and reveal intimacies of body or mind, or both." (7)
Thus compromised, the patient relies heavily on the physician to act
only in the patient’s interest and not the physician’s. A doctor must
put the patient’s needs before his own. But a physician reverses the
priorities when because of passionate political beliefs he tries to
influence his patient against guns. This physician puts his own need to
"do something" about the perceived evil of guns before the needs of his
patient. He crosses the line from healer to political activist. Such
doctor-on-patient political activism is recognized in Epstein and
Simon’s Exploitation Index (8) as a boundary violation.
Just as some physician sexual transgressors may insist their sex
relations with a patient are therapeutic, the activist doctor may
protest that he only seeks to prevent "gun violence." However, the
conduct of the medical activists strongly indicates that their interest
in patients’ guns is political, not therapeutic.
The AAP, ACP, and AMA are members of the Handgun Epidemic Lowering Plan
(HELP) Network, based in Chicago. HELP is an exclusive advocacy group
dedicated to banning guns. Physicians who disagree with HELP’s anti-gun
agenda are barred from attending HELP’s conferences, a policy
unthinkable in any scientific organization. HELP’s founder and leader
Dr. Katherine Christoffel has compared guns to viruses that must be
eradicated. (9) The group’s militant advocacy has no place for differing
viewpoints on firearms, and apparently neither do the medical
organizations which have signed on as HELP members.
In fact, the AAP has adopted its "gun safety instruction" patient
materials from the gun-ban lobby Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI). The AAP
and Handgun Control, Inc.’s informational wing the Center to Prevent
Handgun Violence advise families in their STOP pamphlet, "The safest
thing is to not have a gun in your home, especially not a handgun." (10)
And a survey of pediatricians showed 76% supported a ban on handguns.
(11) Patients who seek objective advice on firearm safety should not
look to pediatricians as a group. And any doctor should know that
patient counseling based on these materials is politics, not medicine.
Perhaps the most revealing aspect of organized medicine’s anti-gun bias
is its persistent refusal to address the criminology literature on guns.
For over twenty years, criminologists have studied firearms, their use
and misuse, their risks and benefits. Especially in the last two years
prominent researchers have found that firearm ownership is not the
scourge that medical activists have claimed it to be. The best and
latest research finds that private gun ownership by responsible citizens
not only is safe, but protects the individual as well as his community
from violent crime. (12)
One would think that medical firearm researchers would be intensely
interested in this scholarship. But so far the editorial boards of the
journals of the AAP, AMA, and ACP have neither responded to nor
acknowledged it. With their silence these editors have effectively ended
whatever credibility they had in firearm research. That field of study
is apparently useful to them only as a vehicle for the advancement of
their political goal of gun prohibition. When the scientific process
yields knowledge contrary to that goal, activists either attack its
author (13) or ignore it altogether. Such conduct is inexcusable in any
area of scientific endeavor. Honest scientists face conflicting data
objectively. And honest doctors do not use biased research to give false
authority to their negative feelings about guns.
So how can a patient tell if his doctor’s advice about guns is good
preventive medicine or political activism? Patients can assess a
doctor’s advice by keeping the following questions in mind:
Does the doctor respect your right to keep guns? Or does he subtly send
a message that guns are somehow bad? Moral judgments about the right to
self defense, hunting, or other legitimate uses of guns are not
acceptable subjects for a doctor talking to a patient. Does the doctor
quote statistics from the American Academy of Pediatrics or the American
Medical Association about the supposed risks of guns in the home? Do you
see anti-gun posters or pamphlets from these organizations in her
office? These materials are based on the "advocacy science" of anti-gun
activists like Dr. Arthur Kellermann, much of which was funded by the
federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Congress cut
off all the CDC’s 1997 funding for gun research because of the CDC’s
anti-gun bias. (14) No doctor who knows firearms would base her advice
on this frankly political literature. Is the doctor familiar with the
National Rifle Association’s (NRA) Eddie Eagle gun safety program for
children, or other established gun safety education programs? If not, is
she interested in learning about them? Unlike the AAP’s Stop program,
Eddie Eagle educational materials for children contain no political or
moral judgment about guns. This NRA program has been honored by the
National Safety Council, the American Legion, and the governments of 19
states. The Eddie Eagle slogan "If you see a gun, Stop, Don’t touch,
Leave the area, Tell an adult" was even endorsed by the generally
anti-gun California Medical Association (CMA). (15) Despite intense
publicity for the AAP’s Stop program and similar initiatives, most
doctors shy away from scrutinizing their patients’ gun ownership. In a
recent study 91% of surveyed doctors felt that firearm violence is a
public health issue. But only 3% said they frequently talk to patients
about firearms in the home. Two thirds of the surveyed doctors said they
never talk to patients about the subject. (16) This may indicate that
although they are generally concerned about firearm injuries, doctors do
not see politically motivated patient counseling as appropriate
professional conduct.
In a revealing section, the AAP’s Stop speaker’s kit warns would-be
lecturers of "resistant audiences" who may disagree with them on
scientific or ideological grounds. One section offers talking points for
dealing with these "challenging individuals." (17) The kit’s authors
seem to anticipate their audiences may recognize its political nature.
Patients do have remedies for the boundary-crossing doctor. In today’s
competitive health care market most patients can choose from many
doctors. Changing doctors is the simplest solution. A written complaint
to the health plan’s membership services department can send a powerful
message that boundary violations by doctors will not be tolerated. If
the problem persists, patients can file a complaint with the doctor’s
state licensing board. Medical licensing boards are increasingly aware
of the problem of boundary violations. Although state boards have
addressed primarily sexual and financial misconduct, the broad
principles they have developed to guide doctors in these areas apply to
the entire doctor-patient relationship. (18, 19)
The author cannot advise the reader to take a particular course of
action. A patient confronted with physician misconduct must decide for
himself which action, if any, to take. But patients should realize they
do have choices in dealing with physician boundary violations involving
political activism, especially in such personal matters as firearm
ownership. And physicians should be aware of the personal risks they
take when they bring political activism into the exam room.
Endnotes
1. HELP Network News
2. , Winter / Spring 1998, p. 1. This quarterly newsletter is published by the Handgun Epidemic Lowering Plan (HELP) Network. Ibid. p. 2.
3. American Academy of Pediatrics Policy Statement, vol. 89, no. 4, April, Part 2, 1992, pp. 788-790.
4. American College of Physicians Position Paper, "Firearm Injury Prevention," Annals of Internal Medicine, 1998, vol. 128, no. 3, p. 238.
5. Frick, D., "Nonsexual Boundary Violations in Psychiatric Treatment," Review of Psychiatry, vol. 13, (Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Press, Inc.), 1994, pp. 415-432.
6. Hundert, E., and Appelbaum, P., "Boundaries in Psychotherapy: Model Guidelines," Psychiatry, vol. 58, November 1995, pp. 346-347.
7. See reference 5, p. 416.
8. See reference 5, pp. 418-419 reprinted with permission from the Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, vol. 56, no. 2, pp. 165-166, The Menninger Foundation, 1992.
9. Somerville, J., "Gun Control as Immunization," American Medical News, Jan. 3, 1994, p. 9.
10. "Keep Your Family Safe From Firearm Injury," American Academy of Pediatrics and Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, 1996.
11. Olson, L., and Christoffel, K., "Pediatricians’ Experience With and Attitudes Toward Firearms," Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, vol. 151, April 1997.
12. Lott, J., More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), 1998.
13. Ibid. pp. 122-157.
14. Report from the Committee on Appropriations, U.S. House of Representatives: Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill, 1997, p. 49.
15. California Medical Association, Actions of the House of Delegates 1995, San Francisco 1995, Resolution 109-95, p. 9. The Eddie Eagle slogan was originally introduced in a resolution crediting its creator, the National Rifle Association (NRA). But the CMA Delegates refused to mention the NRA in the final version of Resolution 109-95, preferring instead to credit the California Department of Justice. This agency had adopted the Eddie Eagle slogan in its own gun safety program.
16. Cassel, C.K., and Nelson, B., "Internists’ and Surgeons’ Attitudes Toward Guns and Firearm Injury Prevention," Annals of Internal Medicine, 1998; vol. 128, pp. 224-30.
17. American Academy of Pediatrics, "Preventing Firearm Injury: Protecting Our Children Speaker’s Kit," tab 1, section 5, Elk Grove Village (Illinois), 1998.
18. Medical Board of California Action Report, April 1996, p. 3, California Department of Consumer Affairs, Sacramento, California.
19. Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine, "General Guidelines Related to the Maintenance of Boundaries in the Practice of Psychotherapy by Physicians (Adult Patients)," Boston.
~~~o~~~
Timothy Wheeler, MD is Director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership,
a project of The Claremont Institute.
~~~o~~~
copyright © 1999 The Claremont Institute
BACK2nd Amendment
4 August 1999
Boundary Violation:
Gun Politics in the Doctor’s Office
Timothy Wheeler, MD
Appeared originally in the Medical Sentinel of the
Association of American Physicians and Surgeons,
March/April 1999, pp. 60-61
Imagine this scenario: you visit your doctor for back pain. Your doctor
asks if you have firearms in your home. Then he announces that your
family would be better off (especially your children) if you had no guns
at all in your house. You leave the doctor’s office feeling uneasy,
wondering what guns have to do with your backache. Does your doctor care
about your family’s safety? Or instead, did he use your trust and his
authority to advance a political agenda?
American families may soon find themselves in this scenario. Social
activists are taking their war on gun ownership to a new battleground:
the doctor’s office. (1) The American Medical Association (AMA) (2),
American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) (3), and American College of
Physicians (ACP) (4) are urging doctors to probe their patients about
guns in their homes. They profess concern for patient safety. But their
ulterior motive is a political prejudice against guns and gun owners.
And that places their interventions into the area of unethical physician
conduct called boundary violations.
Doctor-patient sex is the most well-known and sensational example of a
boundary violation. More recent literature recognizes a wide variety of
nonsexual violations. (5) These cover such issues as finances,
confidentiality, and gratification of the doctor’s needs. Although
boundary violations were first addressed in the psychiatry literature,
it has become clear that they also occur in general medical practice.
(6)
Boundaries in the doctor-patient relationship derive naturally from the
relationship’s fiduciary nature. In general, "treatment boundaries can
be defined as the set of rules that establishes the professional
relationship as separate from other relationships and protects the
patient from harm. A patient who seeks medical or psychiatric treatment
is often in a uniquely dependent, anxious, vulnerable, and exploitable
state. In seeking help, patients assume positions of relative
powerlessness in which they expose their weaknesses, compromise their
dignity, and reveal intimacies of body or mind, or both." (7)
Thus compromised, the patient relies heavily on the physician to act
only in the patient’s interest and not the physician’s. A doctor must
put the patient’s needs before his own. But a physician reverses the
priorities when because of passionate political beliefs he tries to
influence his patient against guns. This physician puts his own need to
"do something" about the perceived evil of guns before the needs of his
patient. He crosses the line from healer to political activist. Such
doctor-on-patient political activism is recognized in Epstein and
Simon’s Exploitation Index (8) as a boundary violation.
Just as some physician sexual transgressors may insist their sex
relations with a patient are therapeutic, the activist doctor may
protest that he only seeks to prevent "gun violence." However, the
conduct of the medical activists strongly indicates that their interest
in patients’ guns is political, not therapeutic.
The AAP, ACP, and AMA are members of the Handgun Epidemic Lowering Plan
(HELP) Network, based in Chicago. HELP is an exclusive advocacy group
dedicated to banning guns. Physicians who disagree with HELP’s anti-gun
agenda are barred from attending HELP’s conferences, a policy
unthinkable in any scientific organization. HELP’s founder and leader
Dr. Katherine Christoffel has compared guns to viruses that must be
eradicated. (9) The group’s militant advocacy has no place for differing
viewpoints on firearms, and apparently neither do the medical
organizations which have signed on as HELP members.
In fact, the AAP has adopted its "gun safety instruction" patient
materials from the gun-ban lobby Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI). The AAP
and Handgun Control, Inc.’s informational wing the Center to Prevent
Handgun Violence advise families in their STOP pamphlet, "The safest
thing is to not have a gun in your home, especially not a handgun." (10)
And a survey of pediatricians showed 76% supported a ban on handguns.
(11) Patients who seek objective advice on firearm safety should not
look to pediatricians as a group. And any doctor should know that
patient counseling based on these materials is politics, not medicine.
Perhaps the most revealing aspect of organized medicine’s anti-gun bias
is its persistent refusal to address the criminology literature on guns.
For over twenty years, criminologists have studied firearms, their use
and misuse, their risks and benefits. Especially in the last two years
prominent researchers have found that firearm ownership is not the
scourge that medical activists have claimed it to be. The best and
latest research finds that private gun ownership by responsible citizens
not only is safe, but protects the individual as well as his community
from violent crime. (12)
One would think that medical firearm researchers would be intensely
interested in this scholarship. But so far the editorial boards of the
journals of the AAP, AMA, and ACP have neither responded to nor
acknowledged it. With their silence these editors have effectively ended
whatever credibility they had in firearm research. That field of study
is apparently useful to them only as a vehicle for the advancement of
their political goal of gun prohibition. When the scientific process
yields knowledge contrary to that goal, activists either attack its
author (13) or ignore it altogether. Such conduct is inexcusable in any
area of scientific endeavor. Honest scientists face conflicting data
objectively. And honest doctors do not use biased research to give false
authority to their negative feelings about guns.
So how can a patient tell if his doctor’s advice about guns is good
preventive medicine or political activism? Patients can assess a
doctor’s advice by keeping the following questions in mind:
Does the doctor respect your right to keep guns? Or does he subtly send
a message that guns are somehow bad? Moral judgments about the right to
self defense, hunting, or other legitimate uses of guns are not
acceptable subjects for a doctor talking to a patient. Does the doctor
quote statistics from the American Academy of Pediatrics or the American
Medical Association about the supposed risks of guns in the home? Do you
see anti-gun posters or pamphlets from these organizations in her
office? These materials are based on the "advocacy science" of anti-gun
activists like Dr. Arthur Kellermann, much of which was funded by the
federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Congress cut
off all the CDC’s 1997 funding for gun research because of the CDC’s
anti-gun bias. (14) No doctor who knows firearms would base her advice
on this frankly political literature. Is the doctor familiar with the
National Rifle Association’s (NRA) Eddie Eagle gun safety program for
children, or other established gun safety education programs? If not, is
she interested in learning about them? Unlike the AAP’s Stop program,
Eddie Eagle educational materials for children contain no political or
moral judgment about guns. This NRA program has been honored by the
National Safety Council, the American Legion, and the governments of 19
states. The Eddie Eagle slogan "If you see a gun, Stop, Don’t touch,
Leave the area, Tell an adult" was even endorsed by the generally
anti-gun California Medical Association (CMA). (15) Despite intense
publicity for the AAP’s Stop program and similar initiatives, most
doctors shy away from scrutinizing their patients’ gun ownership. In a
recent study 91% of surveyed doctors felt that firearm violence is a
public health issue. But only 3% said they frequently talk to patients
about firearms in the home. Two thirds of the surveyed doctors said they
never talk to patients about the subject. (16) This may indicate that
although they are generally concerned about firearm injuries, doctors do
not see politically motivated patient counseling as appropriate
professional conduct.
In a revealing section, the AAP’s Stop speaker’s kit warns would-be
lecturers of "resistant audiences" who may disagree with them on
scientific or ideological grounds. One section offers talking points for
dealing with these "challenging individuals." (17) The kit’s authors
seem to anticipate their audiences may recognize its political nature.
Patients do have remedies for the boundary-crossing doctor. In today’s
competitive health care market most patients can choose from many
doctors. Changing doctors is the simplest solution. A written complaint
to the health plan’s membership services department can send a powerful
message that boundary violations by doctors will not be tolerated. If
the problem persists, patients can file a complaint with the doctor’s
state licensing board. Medical licensing boards are increasingly aware
of the problem of boundary violations. Although state boards have
addressed primarily sexual and financial misconduct, the broad
principles they have developed to guide doctors in these areas apply to
the entire doctor-patient relationship. (18, 19)
The author cannot advise the reader to take a particular course of
action. A patient confronted with physician misconduct must decide for
himself which action, if any, to take. But patients should realize they
do have choices in dealing with physician boundary violations involving
political activism, especially in such personal matters as firearm
ownership. And physicians should be aware of the personal risks they
take when they bring political activism into the exam room.
Endnotes
1. HELP Network News
2. , Winter / Spring 1998, p. 1. This quarterly newsletter is published by the Handgun Epidemic Lowering Plan (HELP) Network. Ibid. p. 2.
3. American Academy of Pediatrics Policy Statement, vol. 89, no. 4, April, Part 2, 1992, pp. 788-790.
4. American College of Physicians Position Paper, "Firearm Injury Prevention," Annals of Internal Medicine, 1998, vol. 128, no. 3, p. 238.
5. Frick, D., "Nonsexual Boundary Violations in Psychiatric Treatment," Review of Psychiatry, vol. 13, (Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Press, Inc.), 1994, pp. 415-432.
6. Hundert, E., and Appelbaum, P., "Boundaries in Psychotherapy: Model Guidelines," Psychiatry, vol. 58, November 1995, pp. 346-347.
7. See reference 5, p. 416.
8. See reference 5, pp. 418-419 reprinted with permission from the Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, vol. 56, no. 2, pp. 165-166, The Menninger Foundation, 1992.
9. Somerville, J., "Gun Control as Immunization," American Medical News, Jan. 3, 1994, p. 9.
10. "Keep Your Family Safe From Firearm Injury," American Academy of Pediatrics and Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, 1996.
11. Olson, L., and Christoffel, K., "Pediatricians’ Experience With and Attitudes Toward Firearms," Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, vol. 151, April 1997.
12. Lott, J., More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), 1998.
13. Ibid. pp. 122-157.
14. Report from the Committee on Appropriations, U.S. House of Representatives: Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill, 1997, p. 49.
15. California Medical Association, Actions of the House of Delegates 1995, San Francisco 1995, Resolution 109-95, p. 9. The Eddie Eagle slogan was originally introduced in a resolution crediting its creator, the National Rifle Association (NRA). But the CMA Delegates refused to mention the NRA in the final version of Resolution 109-95, preferring instead to credit the California Department of Justice. This agency had adopted the Eddie Eagle slogan in its own gun safety program.
16. Cassel, C.K., and Nelson, B., "Internists’ and Surgeons’ Attitudes Toward Guns and Firearm Injury Prevention," Annals of Internal Medicine, 1998; vol. 128, pp. 224-30.
17. American Academy of Pediatrics, "Preventing Firearm Injury: Protecting Our Children Speaker’s Kit," tab 1, section 5, Elk Grove Village (Illinois), 1998.
18. Medical Board of California Action Report, April 1996, p. 3, California Department of Consumer Affairs, Sacramento, California.
19. Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine, "General Guidelines Related to the Maintenance of Boundaries in the Practice of Psychotherapy by Physicians (Adult Patients)," Boston.
~~~o~~~
Timothy Wheeler, MD is Director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership,
a project of The Claremont Institute.
~~~o~~~
copyright © 1999 The Claremont Institute
BACK2nd Amendment
4 August 1999
Lone_Gunman
Member
The "boundary violation" article is frequently posted, but is unfortunately basically a contrived fantasy by Dr. Wheeler.
The "bounds" of medical practice are established by organized medicine within the specialty concerned. For example, other pediatricians decide what is, and is not, within the "bounds" of pediatrics.
So if organized medicine is advocating these types of questions, there is certainly no boundary violation, and one could argue that not asking these questions therefore fails to meet the standard of care set by that specialty, thus opening the practitioner up for litigation.
Rather than crying "boundary violation", and thereby making a fool of yourself, it would be best to tell the doctor involved you do not like those kind of questions, and then leave and see a different doctor. As soon as that doctor realizes he is losing business by pushing a political agenda, he will stop asking them.
The "bounds" of medical practice are established by organized medicine within the specialty concerned. For example, other pediatricians decide what is, and is not, within the "bounds" of pediatrics.
So if organized medicine is advocating these types of questions, there is certainly no boundary violation, and one could argue that not asking these questions therefore fails to meet the standard of care set by that specialty, thus opening the practitioner up for litigation.
Rather than crying "boundary violation", and thereby making a fool of yourself, it would be best to tell the doctor involved you do not like those kind of questions, and then leave and see a different doctor. As soon as that doctor realizes he is losing business by pushing a political agenda, he will stop asking them.
CajunBass
Member
I got one of those questionairs with the "Do you have any guns in your house?" one time from my doctor.
I wrote quite clearly, "None of your business."
Never heard anymore about it.
I wrote quite clearly, "None of your business."
Never heard anymore about it.
bogie
Member
Keep in mind: The doctor in this case is likely not "anti-gun." He's just been fed a line of nonsense, and assumed it to be fact. Odds are, if you are GENTLE, he can be educated.
v35
Member
- Joined
- Feb 8, 2006
- Messages
- 910
Sure, we have guns in the house.
We also have knives in the kitchen. We have toilets full of water - you could drown. Bathtubs too. Ladders, stairs, chairs (you could climb up and fall down), a refrigerator, TV (they could fall on you). I have various power tools that cut, grind, hammer, and drill. They attach to electrical outlets that carry lethal power. Screwdrivers, crowbars, saws, nails, chisels, all sorts of things that cut and poke. There is probably pocket change in the sofa - a child could choke on it. Maybe a paper clip or two also - it and the dozens of electrical outlets I have could be lethal in combination.
Outside there is a lawn mower, a snow thrower, buckets (you could drown again!) and a couple of chain saws. Gasoline, too. There are big, heavy garage doors. Bicycles. There's a rope swing - if you don't fall off the rope swing you could strangle on the rope. There are trees you could climb and from which you could fall down. A neighbor even has a pool.
And although I have never encountered one, there may also be people who might want to bring harm to my family, in my house with all that dangerous stuff inside it.
That's why we have guns in the house.
We also have knives in the kitchen. We have toilets full of water - you could drown. Bathtubs too. Ladders, stairs, chairs (you could climb up and fall down), a refrigerator, TV (they could fall on you). I have various power tools that cut, grind, hammer, and drill. They attach to electrical outlets that carry lethal power. Screwdrivers, crowbars, saws, nails, chisels, all sorts of things that cut and poke. There is probably pocket change in the sofa - a child could choke on it. Maybe a paper clip or two also - it and the dozens of electrical outlets I have could be lethal in combination.
Outside there is a lawn mower, a snow thrower, buckets (you could drown again!) and a couple of chain saws. Gasoline, too. There are big, heavy garage doors. Bicycles. There's a rope swing - if you don't fall off the rope swing you could strangle on the rope. There are trees you could climb and from which you could fall down. A neighbor even has a pool.
And although I have never encountered one, there may also be people who might want to bring harm to my family, in my house with all that dangerous stuff inside it.
That's why we have guns in the house.
Ohen Cepel
Member
I went through some of this same BS with a "military" doctor recently and posted about it some.
We no longer see this person and I have caused as much hell as I can.
I can't vote with my feet but for those who can I think that is the best route to take.
It has little if any "medical" merit and should not be tolerated.
We no longer see this person and I have caused as much hell as I can.
I can't vote with my feet but for those who can I think that is the best route to take.
It has little if any "medical" merit and should not be tolerated.
Aguila Blanca
Member
Falsehood.
I grew up with guns in everyone's house -- grandfather, uncles, everyone. There were 3 in my family, 3 cousins in another house down the street, and 2 more across the street from tham. Grandparents in between. All us kids knew where all the guns were. And nobody touched them unless one of the adults agreed to take us shooting.
The doctor's attitude is typical of people who have NOT grown up with guns, have NOT received any firearms safety training, and therefor do NOT know what the [blank] they are talking about.
Webster, it's time to find a new pediatrician -- and then write a letter to the old one explaining that you switched because he crossed an ethical line, stopped being a doctor, and started meddling into personal family business that is none of HIS business.
Despite what the AMA wants to believe, firearms are not epidemiology.
As a Medical Doctor, in reading some of these posts, I have to laugh. Many are using anti-gunner tactics on physicians. A doctor asked little Tommy about guns therefore ALL DOCTORS ARE ANTIGUN, or SOCIALIZED MEDICINE IS OUT TO GET CHA. A bit of a stretch.
The fact that I am a doctor and I could care less about my patient's firearm collection disputes such generalizations. I also am not a member of the AMA, nor will I ever be. Several of my partners are gun nuts and many shoot. Most of the male specialists I worked with in residency owned firearms.
Most physicians are Republicans. The majority of physicians are NOT members of the AMA. Just because the AMA and the AAP post such nonsense, do not believe that the majority of physicians follow those guidelines. Thinking that the AMA and the AAP speak for every doctor is as silly as thinking that the blue states speak for every American. We know damn well that's not the case.
For those who speak of physicians is disparaging terms, I ask you to recall all the positive times a physician positively impacted your life. Few here on THR would be openly critical of police, firefighters, EMTs or other lifesavers in the community, yet you criticize myself and other physician members of THR with such alacrity. Such bigotry is very dissappointing.
If you don't like your doc--pick another. We still live in a free, open market society. If you live in Columbus, come see me.
The fact that I am a doctor and I could care less about my patient's firearm collection disputes such generalizations. I also am not a member of the AMA, nor will I ever be. Several of my partners are gun nuts and many shoot. Most of the male specialists I worked with in residency owned firearms.
Most physicians are Republicans. The majority of physicians are NOT members of the AMA. Just because the AMA and the AAP post such nonsense, do not believe that the majority of physicians follow those guidelines. Thinking that the AMA and the AAP speak for every doctor is as silly as thinking that the blue states speak for every American. We know damn well that's not the case.
For those who speak of physicians is disparaging terms, I ask you to recall all the positive times a physician positively impacted your life. Few here on THR would be openly critical of police, firefighters, EMTs or other lifesavers in the community, yet you criticize myself and other physician members of THR with such alacrity. Such bigotry is very dissappointing.
If you don't like your doc--pick another. We still live in a free, open market society. If you live in Columbus, come see me.
LJWebster1
Member
Curare, thanks for the post. I hope I did not disparage our doctor as a doctor. He is very good, and my kids love him. But he poked his nose where it shouldn't have been and it bugged me. I'd like to write him a letter, but my wife would probably never speak to me again if it prejudiced the relationship.
I am a physician too and I have another take. These physicians are being taught to ask these types of questions to get you to remove your firearms. I do not ask my patients a litany of intrusive questions. Do not let anyone tell you the physician needs to know all about you. Only what is necessary for your problem. There is a concerted effort to treat gun violence as a disease and guns as the germ. I believe John Hopkins Medical School is a big pusher of this concept. I am your physician not your mommy or daddy. I have never heard of these type of question being requied by an insurance company. As a matter of fact I have never had an insurance company require that I do anything. They are more happy with the less I do. There may be some of the big City HMO's that have this policy but I have never heard of it. Even if told to ask these question I would NOT do it. I am not controlled or easily lead as some. Look out for the young physicians as they are the ones being Socially Enginerred for the great Government take over of medicine and more of your life. I am not offended by any remarks one would make. These type of physicians deserve to be looked down upon. Physicians are some of the hardest people to get along with. I know I work with some jerks everyday.:banghead:
I'm glad its gone.
Thank you staff!
As to the doctor thing, my youngest child is 27, so I guess it never came up. If it had, I'm sure the doctor would have got an earful from my wife (she was usually the one at the office with the kids).
As far as kids being curious and playing with guns, well, it didn't happen at my house. The ones we worried about were the neighbor kids.
ReadyontheRight
Member
This issue is not about the psychology of children. I'm sure we all can think of one child and one adult in our lives where -- in a pinch -- we'd rather hand a loaded gun to the child.
Of course guns should be secure and children can be taught safe gun handling.
Duh.
This is about the Doctor pushing an anti-gun political agenda through children.
His questions were wrong and the AMA needs a continual wake-up call on this misuse of a Doctor's trust.
If he was running through a time-tested checklist -- swimming pools, buckets, household chemicals, seat belts, firearms, etc. -- it MIGHT be commendable, but the reality is that he probably just read some JAMA article and thought its anti-gun program made sense.
Of course guns should be secure and children can be taught safe gun handling.
Duh.
This is about the Doctor pushing an anti-gun political agenda through children.
His questions were wrong and the AMA needs a continual wake-up call on this misuse of a Doctor's trust.
If he was running through a time-tested checklist -- swimming pools, buckets, household chemicals, seat belts, firearms, etc. -- it MIGHT be commendable, but the reality is that he probably just read some JAMA article and thought its anti-gun program made sense.
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geekWithA.45
Moderator Emeritus
The unusual element of this thread is that the pediatrician posed the question to the child DIRECTLY, bypassing the parents.
Guns, like many other topics, are the parents, and the parents alone to arbitrate. It's entirely innapropriate to ask the child about them in an official capacity.
THAT's a HUGE problem.
Would we accept a doctor asking a child "How many beers does daddy have after work?" Would we accept a doctor asking a kid "Does mommy keep a bottle of liquor in the closet?"
Sure, we could argue about "assessing potential threats to the child's well being" till the cows come home, but by then, we're halfway down the slippery slope to hell.
From there, it's a short hop skip and jump to "Do mommy & daddy approve of the great leader, er, President?"
It's fishing, plain and simple.
Guns, like many other topics, are the parents, and the parents alone to arbitrate. It's entirely innapropriate to ask the child about them in an official capacity.
THAT's a HUGE problem.
Would we accept a doctor asking a child "How many beers does daddy have after work?" Would we accept a doctor asking a kid "Does mommy keep a bottle of liquor in the closet?"
Sure, we could argue about "assessing potential threats to the child's well being" till the cows come home, but by then, we're halfway down the slippery slope to hell.
From there, it's a short hop skip and jump to "Do mommy & daddy approve of the great leader, er, President?"
It's fishing, plain and simple.
I think this is a fair statement. I hate to admit this, but here goes. Like many, I grew up in a house with guns that were stored somewhat securely. I was also taught from an early age how to safely handle a firearm and was also told not to do so without permission. Despite this, I handled several of them when I was home alone. I don't know how often this happened, but it wasn't that many times. Despite doing something that I knew would get me into trouble, I had enough sense to never load them, or otherwise handle them in an unsafe manner.
Until I became a parent, I never thoguth much about this. Nothing bad ever happened and, despite being a mostly good kid, it wasn't the only thing I did that my parents didn't want me to do. The lesson I learned is that I will empasize safety, training and education. I want my children to be able to handle a firearm if I am there or not. I will also secure them so that they do not have access to them until I decide they are mature enough to handle the responsibility.
As for the pediatrician questioning gun ownership, it hasn't come up so far.
HankB
Member
"Well, actually, Doctor, it's all about managing risk. Statistically, an argument can be made that Little Johnny is in MORE danger here, seeing as mistakes made by medical professionals cause more deaths than do people misusing guns. In fact, I think I'll be taking him home now, where he just may be safer than he is right here."
"And please note, you'll be getting a call from another pediatrician for Johnny's records, as we'll be finding one who knows how to stick to things he knows something about, and not meddle in areas where he's demonstrated his own ignorance."
"And please note, you'll be getting a call from another pediatrician for Johnny's records, as we'll be finding one who knows how to stick to things he knows something about, and not meddle in areas where he's demonstrated his own ignorance."
entropy
Member
My doctor knows the answer to the question anyway; I often see him at the gun shop.
PlayboyPenguin
member
I got curious about all the nubers people where using to "doctor bash" on here so I looked up those numbers. Every reference I could find to "doctors causing death" refered to the same article in the JAMA. I then had to look up that article to see what it said for myself. Do you know it included non-doctor error deaths (meaning the doctor did nothing wrong the patient was just too old or too sick to respond to treatment), non-doctor error prescription drug issues (which would include people misusing the drugs, failing to take them or even overdosing), delayed diagnosis (often meaning the people just waited too long to come in and the doctor did not have time to adequately diagnosis them), pharmacist giving patients the wrong medication, patients succumbing to infection, and alot of other things that did not make sense to me if the conclusion was to be how many deaths "doctors cause". Plus they never really mentioned what the determination process was...there was obviously no control group with which to compare data. Sounds a lot like the same kind of stuff that anti-gunnies do when manipulating info to make guns look more dangerous than they are in reality. Just like guns ARE dangerous, but not as dangerous as some would have you believe...some doctors DO kill people...but not anything like this study suggests. I know we all hate seeing skewed studies about gun ownership, I am suprised so many were so eager to latch onto this information without more scrutiny. If anyone was able to find more info than I was feel free to set me straight.
Otherguy Overby
member
Malpractice?
Could their be grounds for malpractice?
Physician talked with child regarding guns without parent authorization.
He talk about guns with MY CHILD!
Is he a licensed phychiatrist? If not, is he practicing with out the proper license?
Could their be a chance of an attorney pulling the plug on this particular social engineering scandal?
Could their be grounds for malpractice?
Physician talked with child regarding guns without parent authorization.
He talk about guns with MY CHILD!
Is he a licensed phychiatrist? If not, is he practicing with out the proper license?
Could their be a chance of an attorney pulling the plug on this particular social engineering scandal?
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