Question

• What are the different types of healthcare records and where are they often stored?
• What is considered an active record and an inactive record?
• What is the difference between purging records and destroying records?
• When are healthcare records allowed to be destroyed and what are some of the reason’s records would be destroyed?

Answer 1

Medical records are those which include health care records, medical charts and other such records like x-rays, reports, test results,etc.The maintenance of medical records is required by health care providers.Traditionally, medical records are maintained physically but due to the advancement in technology they are maintained or stored online by patients themselves termed as personal health records which are provided in third-party websites.

Active records are those which are actively used for the treatment of the patients whereas inactive records are those which are used rarely or sparingly used for the treatment of the patients but may be used for future reference.

Purged records means separating the records into active and inactive records based on the retention schedule of the records.For the purpose of purging the medical records there should be an effective system in place.Whereas, destroying of medical records means destroying the physical or electronic form of the records on a permanent basis.

Healthcare records are allowed to be destroyed according to the federal and state law pursuant to a schedule retention policy.There is no single standard record destruction policy.The organisation should reassess the method of destruction on an annual basis after taking into account the latest technology, accepted practices and availability of timely and cost-effective destruction services.One of the main reasons for the destruction of medical records is due to the shortage of storage capacity, fiscal restraints and since the service providers are unable to maintain the records indefinitely.