Mrs. Homie and I moved from Illinois to Missouri recently, and with the move came new insurance plans, new Primary Care Physician, and all that.
My new family doctor wanted us to apply to be her patient - meaning, I had to authorize my family’s old medical records from Illinois to be sent to her, for review, and then she would determine whether or not we would be her patients. She approved us, FWIW: hardly surprising, since our medical records are entirely mundane.
Presumably, she did this to weed out (heh) drug-seekers. I’m curious if this is done by law in Missouri (all physicians must screen new patients for patterns of drug-seeking), or if this is simply my own doctor’s method of keeping her own practice free of druggies.
Also, when I have my physical next Tuesday, she’s going to ask the routine lifestyle questions about alcohol, tobacco, and drug use. Am I dooming myself by admitting that I smoke pot?
Depends on the Doctor probably. It took me a few weeks to work up the courage to tell mine, but he just shrugged it off and said to at least use from a certified co-op.
My doctor asks a lot of questions, but I don’t think she has ever asked me if I smoke pot. I haven’t felt the need to volunteer the information either. I did answer the question honestly on an application for life insurance once. I got rejected by one company, but accepted by another.
The OP may be making an unwarranted assumption. My sister (rest her soul), a 30-year RN, was working on the Hopi Reservation in AZ for the IHS when diagnosed with the cancer that would kill her. She came back to OK and was looking for a physician. She said something to the effect that, given her diagnosis (stage 4 colon cancer) she might not be able to find a doctor that would take her on. When I expressed surprise, she pointed out that doctors do not have to take on a prospective patient. She found a doctor but of course it was to little avail.
In CA, I will call and ask if the doctor is accepting new patients.
What follows is known as an “establishment” appointment - I fill out the forms, we chat, doc decides I am probably not an axe murderer (yet), and now doc is my PCP.
I’ve never had a hint that the doc would accept/reject an individual.
This is interesting. (Credentials: Doctor’s wife and sometime office manager who used to reside near St. Louis) I wouldn’t mention the pot unless it is relevant…or excessive. You sound savvy enough to make the determination. The assessment? My best guess is that the doctor is screening whether or not the reimbursement schedule per your insurance is worth your difficulty level as a patient. In other words, will the office ultimately receive $40/visit but you have 3 comorbidities, an undiagnosed autoimmunological ailment, and see 6 specialists they will have to (at least pretend to) fax crap back and forth to.
I doubt it has much to do with screening for opiate-seekers, but you never know these days, particularly with the INSPECT monitoring system in the Midwest. I don’t think Missouri is quite on board with it yet, but I’m not in the loop so much these days. IMHO, the INSPECT system is crap, but it’s in style right now.
However, you seem to be preoccupied with that angle in your post. Do you have a chronic pain issue that you’ll need to address with new PCP?
Tangentially related, my SO has been seeing her doctor for many years. Her doctor told her that she was the last Medicare Plan patient she was seeing. SO says doctor told her that before reaching age 65, she would tell her patients that they would have to find another doctor. She was unwilling to see Medicare patients. I can speculate why this is so - reimbursement rates, governmental oversight, etc. The doctor kept her on because she had been her patient for so long and she likes my SO.
If I seem “preoccupied” it’s only because it bothers me to no end that this ferkakte Drug War has wiggled its way in to the Doctor/Patient relationship.
No, I don’t have a chronic pain issue knock on wood, and as far as I can tell, I have no more or no fewer medical issues than any other obese, non-smoker, middle-aged man (again, knock on wood).
Should a chronic pain issue ever arise, I’m completely aware of a natural, non-addictive way to treat it. Unfortunately, the feds and the State of Missouri both view that treatment as having no medicinal value, but that’s a topic for another thread.
MO resident here, definitely not a law but I now wonder what area you live in. Independence maybe? Some good parts and some really bad ones or perhaps KC proper?
Viburnum, which is a little speck on the map about 100 miles south and west of St. Louis. Meth is big here, and I imagine Oxycontin is (or was) big, too. Rural Missouri has a bit of a drug problem.
