Is a Primary Care Physician Obligated to Send a 17 Year Old Minor Using Heroin to Rehab?

Question by : Is a Primary Care Physician obligated to send a 17 year old Minor using heroin to rehab?
If a minor of 17 living in Arizona is using heroin and tells their Primary Care Physician would the Primary Care Physician be obligated by law to make said minor attend any sort of rehab?

Best answer:

Answer by George Dalton
No, he will be bound by the patient – client secrecy, but he would be a very bad professional not to do his best to convince the minor to enter some kind of out-patient treatment program.

It is just not worth it to use drugs. Please be a good friend and do an intervention on the 17 year old and arrange for the entire network to enter the wilderness on a camping trip taking shifts until he is detoxed and ready for real therapy.

Forget any other method than speaking the 17 year old directly face to face. No one can deal with a problem they don’t acknowledge, so avoid all kind of inpatient treatment until he steps by and ask for treatment himself.

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