Medical records.

I am in the process of changing sleep doctors and the old doctor wants to charge me for copies of my medical records. Is this legal??

oceanpearl wrote:I am in the process of changing sleep doctors and the old doctor wants to charge me for copies of my medical records. Is this legal??

I think he can charge you for the paper and printing cost(Like they can't afford to eat the cost!), but not for the actual records.. I could be wrong!

HIPAA allows the generating facility to charge a "reasonable" fee for copies of your medical records. The generating facility "owns" the records, the patient's right is to copies of them. One local hospital gets away w/a $10 fee to access the records on their 'puters and then $1 a page for copying. Needless to say I do NOT patronize that hospital!

The way around that charge is to request that they be provided to your family doctor (assuming your family doctor will give you copies). They almost never charge to provide copies to a fellow medical professional - unless they are real sheisters. They are usually provided to fellow medical professionals as a courtesy.

The ONE facility that has gotten away w/NOT providing copies to me is Quest Labs. I've refused to use them for years - long before HIPAA - simply because they would not even allow a ROI for the results to be released to my family doctor as well as the referring doctor. They would release to the referring doctor only. I've never used Quest since and am right up front telling my doctors I will NOT use Quest.

It is common and legal for the doc to charge for the cost of copying records. He has to pay someone to do it and the paper and ink are not free. I do not know if there is a standard fee or if there is a point where the charges are so high that they are illegal. Seems to me most I have dealt with charge 25 cents a page or so.

Heck, yeah! They have to make a profit, too.....so they can pay for their SUVs, boats, BMWs and Mercedes, golf course memberships, vacation homes, etc., etc. Oh, and there's also their building, equipment, staff, utilities and training.
Right?

If the DMEs can charge the customers an extra $200 over and above what they're allowed by the insurance, the doctors sure can charge for whatever they can get away with, too.

Den

Aw c'mon, Den ... although I'd love to make the $ the docs do, I sure wouldn't want to work their hours!

Mindy

mindy wrote:Aw c'mon, Den ... although I'd love to make the $ the docs do, I sure wouldn't want to work their hours!

Mindy

Oh, I forgot one other thing......THEIR insurance premiums. They have BIG insurance liability (malpractice) premiums. They have to pay for the idiots who still "practice" their profession....and (for example) remove/operate on the wrong thing in their patients.

There is absolutely NOTHING about that profession that has ever appealed to me. And, there isn't enough money in it for me.....

Den (perfectly content to have been "operating" on computers for all these years)

Have the new doctor request the records from the one who has them. You will probably have to go into the new doctor's office prior to your appointment and sign a consent form for them to request them. That way you should get around having to pay for anything. I know when I worked for a doctor's office, we charged a fee to patients to copy records because of supplies and labor involved, but sent records to other doctor's offices without charge. Hope this works for you