Doctor visits

[jazzlover]

Now that Obamacare is here should I tell my doctor I smoke a pipe. Should I emphasize that I don't inhale? Should I tell my dentist? How will that impact my health insurance premiums?

 

[warren]

I suspect you should direct this question to your insurance specialist. Your doctor and dentist probably still have very little idea about what is covered and what is not. This law has little to do with your actual health care and everything to do about money. If you pay your own bills you should see no difference in doctor or dentist care. If you have others paying your bills, you should be talking with them.
Again, I suspect that at this time most health care professionals still have no real idea what the government will allow the insurance companies to cover. The insurance companies have some idea but the government changes the rules from day to day.
I believe this is what is referred to as a SNAFU!

 

[leacha]

Any information that is provided will go into a database and will always be there for later use. Think before providing any information to anybody.
It's the age we now live in.

 

[warren]

If you buy pipes, tobacco, etc. on-line then that information is in someone's data base.
My suggestion is that if you wish to keep information like that non-public, you must purchase in person, pay cash and then kill whomever sold you the product and anyone else who witnessed the purchase. Also, any relatives, spouses (exes and current), children, or acquaintances who possess any of your sensitive information.
There really are no secrets anymore, This is especially true if more than one person has the information you are trying to protect.

 

[dochudson]

remember anything said to a Doc, Dentist, whatever medical professional ends up in a huge database to be accessed by a log list of suspects.

 

[puffy]

A few years ago my doctor asked me if I smoke.I told him that I smoke a pipe.He told me that he smokes cigars.The subject hasn't been mentioned again.

 

[mso489]

Since some studies show pipe smokers live a little longer, the insurance companies may not want to

carry you into your nineties and beyond.

 

[cigrmaster]

Since no one does blood tests to show what is in your system, I would not mention it.

 

[crazypipe]

I would not say a word ,about it. ::

 

[phred]

I have so far suffered no ill effects from being completely honest with my medical and dental providers - my doc is far more concerned with my Vitamin D deficiency than with the paltry one-bowl-a-week habit that I've copped to. And my dental hygienist merely asked that I follow Kashmir's example and use a soft bit (she didn't mention K. by name, of course... :D )

 

[salewis]

By smoker these web sites usually mean cigarettes. When asked I always say I am not a smoker.

 

[cigrmaster]

Insurance companies do not differentiate between a cigarette smoker and a pipe smoker so if you say you smoke pipes, then they will rate you as a cigarette smoker and you are toast.

 

[peter70]

Well, if you lie in an official inurance paper, they could sue you and demand their money back, or worse, deny coverage, when you most need it. Blood or other tests are bound to come, if not officially, then inofficially in some kind of general health examination.
I say, in a casual talk, you can say, what you want, but, when you have to put your signature under a contract, stay honest. If you can't afford the higher rates, stop smoking.