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How Long Should I Keep My Patients' Medical Records? Disposition of Records and Records Retention for Medical Records, Including Electronic Records

Wednesday, 18 October 2017  10:00 AM PDT, 01:00 PM EDT

Training Duration = 60 Min                    Sponsored by Online Compliance Panel

Click Here to register $200.00

Click Here to register and receive CD recording $400.00

In a complex health services environment with many different health care practitioners, individual practitioners and directors at health care facilities may be confused on how long to retain -- and whether to dispose of -- medical records. Does having digital records require records to be kept indefinitely, or does it simply allow it?

Differing and even conflicting sources of requirements exist for the retention and disposition of medical records, which may vary based upon the specific health care practitioner. With the majority of medical records moving to an electronic format, special rules now exist with regard to the confidentiality, security, retention, and disposition of electronic medical records.

Learn to identify and apply these differing and conflicting rules with respect to the specific health care practitioner, the specific health care facility practice, and the emerging rules and regulations for electronic medical records confidentiality, security, and disposition.

Learning Objectives:

  • To know sources of legal requirements for medical records retention
  • To identify sources of contractual requirements for medical records retention
  • To state what information is mandated to be in a specific health care practitioner's medical record
  • To understand facility rules as applied to the individual health care practitioner
  • To update electronic records confidentiality, retention, and disposition
  • To focus on professional wills and business succession plans for the health care practitioner to govern the retention of medical records
  • To grasp reasons for creating and implementing a medical records policy for the health care practitioner's withdrawal from practice, incapacity, or death

Why Should You Attend:

Working in today's diverse, fast-changing, multidisciplinary health care environment, record keeping varies greatly from health care professional to health care professional. In addition to clinical requirements of a specific profession, additional state laws set forth the content and retention of other types of records, other than clinical records of a patient, that are also kept by the professional, such as supervisory agreements with other professionals subordinate to them as well as their own unique record content requirements.

The professional should attend to understand a broad perspective on the many sources of requirements for the retention and disposition of medical records across the spectrum of health care, both legal and private/contractual requirements.

One area covered specifically concerns electronic record such when mental health services are offered over the internet, the risks of breaches of confidentiality also vastly increase. And when the successful doctor-patient relationship is over, how does the health care practitioner providing a mental health service dispose of these electronic records?

In addition to the sources of rules that govern the confidentiality, retention, and disposition of medical records, there are other sources of requirements for compliance with facility laws and contractual agreements.

In addition to state law requirements, how long should the health care practitioner retain records for the possible, future defense of a malpractice claim for negligent treatment? Or to retain such medical records when the patient is a minor? Or to defend a possible complaint and disciplinary action by a state regulatory agency which could revoke the professional license of the practitioner? Find the answers to these questions governing the retention of medical records in broad contexts

Instructor

Mark R. Brengelman JD, MA

Mark worked as the assigned counsel to numerous health professions licensure boards as an Assistant Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Moving to private practice, he now helps private clients including health care practitioners who are professionally licensed in a wide variety of contexts.

Mark became interested in the law when he graduated with both Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Philosophy from Emory University in Atlanta. He then earned a Juris Doctorate from the University of Kentucky College of Law. In 1995, Mark became an Assistant Attorney General and focused in administrative and professional law where he represented multiple boards as General Counsel and Prosecuting Attorney.

Mark is a frequent participant in continuing education and has been a presenter for over thirty-one national and state organizations and private companies, including webinars and in-person seminars. National and state organizations include the Kentucky Bar Association, the Kentucky Office of the Attorney General, and the National Attorneys General Training and Research Institute.