Recently the State of Illinois passed a law that will make it mandatory for medical providers to send copies of patient records to requesters on a CD for a charge of seventy-five cents per CD.  Because so many thought this pricing was unfair, the law was changed to half the paper rate.  Other states are enacting legislation like this because lawmakers believe that getting a copy of an electronic document is easy: all you have to do is press a button, and the copies simply appear.

I know many of my employees are reading this and shaking their heads.  Health information managers and those who work closely with electronic records are also expressing their frustration with the notion that health records stored electronically are easier to manage, share and print. 

The truth is, the electronic record was never meant to be printed.  Part of the beauty of having an electronic record was the lack of or limited amount of paper that would be generated or used, the ability to limit and track users to documents, data storage, and having information organized and easier for providers to access.  Sharing the record via printing documents is a process that must be improved. 

The notion that the cost of the labor and materials used to get copies of medical information should be seventy-five cents per CD is just another sign that lawmakers often make laws with no real understanding of what its impact will be.  The solution in Illinois is to have a committee meet again to craft some changes to the existing law that will make all parties happy.  If the Illinois Trial Bar feels .75 per CD is sufficient and the medical providers want the prevailing rates for copies of pages, base fees, retrieval fees, and postage to be included in the pricing, it will take more than a few committee meetings to come to an agreement of changes in pricing for this law.  The Illinois legislation is just bad law gone wrong due to a lack of understanding of the process of obtaining copies of medical information.

We can anticipate copycat legislation in other states.  Already some states are crafting language with regard to charging less for electronic copies because the information is stored in a different format. 

We know that the actual “release” of the medical information takes skill and an understanding of computer applications, knowing alternate record storage mediums, knowledge of state and federal laws, exceptional reading skills, and attention to the details contained on requests and authorizations.  

In the coming months you may be asked to help lobby legislators in your states as we watch for electronic fees for medical records legislation creep onto our radar.  Getting lawmakers to fully understand the process of releasing medical information is important so that laws like the one in Illinois won’t be passed anywhere else.