Report: Feds Pressuring More Doctors to Ask Patients About Their Guns

The feds are using Medicare reimbursements along with the new electronic medical record format standardized by the government to coerce doctors to ask patients about their guns and other personal questions, reported Dr. Mark Kestner, who writes for The Murfreesboro Post.

“In essence, the feds are using their control of Medicare reimbursement to manipulate how your physician handles your personal health information,” he wrote. “As part of that process, the doctors are required to seek the answers to a certain number of personal questions from all their patients, including asking about gun ownership.”

The new electronic format allows the information to be made “available to government entities,” Dr. Kestner added.

“The federal Medicare program is structured in such a way that physicians had little choice but to comply with the program,” he continued. “On the one hand, if physicians complied with the program fully by last year they were rewarded with a financial incentive of several thousand dollars.”

“However, if they delayed or failed to agree to provide the data they will be penalized by a certain percentage of Medicare payments going forward.”

“Medicare reimbursement is already quite restricted and often doesn’t cover the actual costs for the services covered,” Dr. Kestner emphasized.

While some doctors are already asking patients about their firearms, it now appears the feds are ramping up this inquisition amid the recent appointment of the new Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Hallegere Murthy, who called gun ownership “a public health issue.”

“[I'm] tired of politicians playing politics with guns, putting lives at risk because they’re scared of [the] NRA,” he tweeted out in 2012. “Guns are a health care issue.”

More