Law for full in lab sleep report

Hey everyone I was wondering if we as the patients are able to get our full in lab study data if we ask for it. The reason I ask this is the I came upon an article that my sister gave me and I saw it stating that a new federal law lets U.S. patients directly access their lab test results

Oh and if we are not allowed access to the data then why not? I can't think of a good reason why. (P.s. I am inquiring about the full raw data and not the summary)

Yes, of course you should get your reports... by law.

I got my full study last year and am expecting the same for the one I just had three weeks ago.
Its a little bit of a hassle for the sleep lab, but they can burn a DVD for you that shows everything.
So, ask nicely

I just had a sleep study a few days ago. I brought in a signed copy of their records release form with me, but found that it is fully accessible on the hospitals website with the account I have when it is available. Will be a few more days. It was the first thing I asked about before the study began.

JDS74 wrote:I got my full study last year and am expecting the same for the one I just had three weeks ago.
Its a little bit of a hassle for the sleep lab, but they can burn a DVD for you that shows everything.
So, ask nicely

How would they burn it onto a DVD? Under what program would I be able to view it on? And can I have access to that program?

And what if they say "no" isn't that illegal?

Krelvin wrote:I just had a sleep study a few days ago. I brought in a signed copy of their records release form with me, but found that it is fully accessible on the hospitals website with the account I have when it is available. Will be a few more days. It was the first thing I asked about before the study began.

Crap... I am not so sure my hospital has such an advanced website to show data.

sleepinow wrote:

JDS74 wrote:I got my full study last year and am expecting the same for the one I just had three weeks ago.
Its a little bit of a hassle for the sleep lab, but they can burn a DVD for you that shows everything.
So, ask nicely

How would they burn it onto a DVD? Under what program would I be able to view it on? And can I have access to

Its the same type of thing that you get when you ask for a copy of your MRI DVD. You get all the various data files that were recorded, EEG strips, RERA strips, video, pulse-ox data and so forth. Plus you get viewer software that lets you look at everything. I think its Windows only but I wouldn't make a wager on that being certain.

One thing though, you better have a really fast computer 'cause this thing is a real resource hog.

It would be nice to have a real reason for needing this data because its such a hassle for them to produce it for you. In my case, I needed (wanted) to look at the video to see if I could see anything leading up to my frequent awakenings that were not SDB related. Its a health problem I've been trying to solve for 10 years with little success. I've been to the Mayo Clinic twice and to my local docs three times for extensive work-ups without being able to isolate the cause. I get a set of symptoms every 45 to 90 minutes all day long. At night,the result is I wake up abruptly, during the day, its just uncomfortable. A little time ago, I watched my pulse-ox data during one of these (that's why I'm awake at 1:40 AM instead of sleeping nicely) and in the course of maybe 20 seconds, the SpO2 number went from 91% to 96%.

Sorry about being so long-winded

sleepinow wrote:How would they burn it onto a DVD? Under what program would I be able to view it on? And can I have access to that program?

A DVD is just like a read only hard drive. They would burn the report including graphs and charts as a way to give you the info. A basic DVD can hold up to 720gb of data which is a lot more space than you can send via email etc. When inserted into a computer you normally can view the PDF or other documents using common software tools. If you can't read one (don't have a DVD reader) then you could have a friend or family member that can.

And what if they say "no" isn't that illegal?

Yes it is. As of Feb 2013 the HIPAA Privacy Rules were updated to allow you got get access to test results..

Krelvin wrote:A basic DVD can hold up to 720gb of data which is a lot more space than you can send via email etc. When inserted into a computer you normally can view the PDF or other documents using common software tools.

I'm sure you meant that a basic CD can hold about 720meg.

a single layer DVD can hold about 4.7gb, a dual layer can hold about 8.5g.

dual layer bluray disks can hold up to about 50gig.

All my sleep lab report pages, my titration, my script and other office notes came to less than 1 meg. I have a 50 meg incoming e-mail limit. No physical media should be necessary, surely?

Hubby broke two fingers on vacation, and they sent us the ER X-rays on a dvd.
The viewing software was also on the disk.

englandsf wrote:All my sleep lab report pages, my titration, my script and other office notes came to less than 1 meg. I have a 50 meg incoming e-mail limit. No physical media should be necessary, surely?

If you ask for and get the full data from the PSG, you get, among other things, 6 - 8 hours of video.
You also get the same kind of data for the oximetry data, the EEG data, the waveform data, the RERA data, etc. All of those files are quite large. This is the data from which the reports you got are derived. And they are all realtime data streams.

Thank you guys for your responses! This one place was a bit hesitant to give me data. Now I shall request from them again
Seriously though it is really great that you guys give help to people!

I am a health care provider, and yes - you have a right to every single note, comment, report or anything else in your file. You may be asked to pay for copies of your report (which can get costly) or to pay for a DVD with your information. Some places give it out for free, some charge. That part is up to the facility - but they cannot withhold any of your documents from you.