Posted by WorryGirl on May 4, 2003, at 9:50:52
In reply to Re: Stealing medical records??, posted by stjames on May 4, 2003, at 1:53:40
> > Mental health records are probably not viewable to the patient, since, for obvious reasons, the patient may or may not be stable enough to view them.
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> Wait a min, here. YOU PAID FOR THEM, so you can see them.I agree with you 100%. I think that if you have paid for the service you should be entitled to copies of the records, and shouldn't even be charged for those. I think that the cost of the copies should already have been calculated into the cost of your health care (5 cents, 5 dollars, whatever it costs for the copies).
I somehow thought that, probably, mental health records might not be viewable to at least some of the patients, if they were determined to be unstable. I could picture an unlikely, but possible horrible scenario where the patient reads in the records that he or she is "unstable and a possible threat to this family", then goes home and shoots his/her family.
Maybe pdocs allow patients to view their own records depending upon the diagnosis and assessment of their mental state. Does anyone know if all mental health records are viewable by any patient, regardless of their condition, whether for a fee or not?
I suspect that I was being audio-taped, maybe even videotaped when I saw my therapist last year. He rarely seemed to be taking notes. Either I was so boring that he didn't need to take many, or he has a great memory and saved his note-taking for later (somehow I doubt that; he seemed rather lacksadaisal, often appearing to have almost fallen asleep while I talked, but not when he was talking, which was often). Anyway, I wanted to ask what my records/notes said several times, but was afraid to. Now I wish I had at least tried. I wonder if I could request copies from him now, several months later.
poster:WorryGirl
thread:223854
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030426/msgs/224208.html