Government Regulations

In my mind, there is no question that government continues to intrude on our lives more and more. Whenever we have a new patient come into the office, because of government rules, we have to electronically sign all the different forms that the government requires us to have. These are primarily part of HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. And although it may seem like a pain in the neck, they are the government's way of protecting us from ourselves. Often times I will have patient's comment to me about the number of forms they have to sign and I relate to them that it is similar to buying a car or buying a house or signing that crazy contract with Apple when they are upgrading our software. These are forms that are drawn up by a team of attorneys you never really want to read, but it is probably better for you if you do. In our particular situation when the patients get a little frustrated in signing the forms my comment to them is usually the same, “the government will protect you from everything ill that will ever happen to you,. All you have to do is sign away all of your rights and give them all your money.” That is meant as a joke, but the way things are going it really seems like there may be a lot of truth in saying that. It certainly will be interesting to see how our next presidential election works out in November.  It will definitely give us some indication as to the direction that we are heading in our country. In my opinion, hopefully government does not get any more intrusive than it already is. By the way, having reached Medicare age I'm wondering how I managed to survive so long.