Is it against HIPAA regulations to not include records received from other clinics when a patient asks for a copy of their medical records to be sent to a new clinic? In other words, is it ok to only include the medical records for what occurred at our clinic?
1 Answer
I am hoping you found an answer elsewhere, since this post is old.
The short of your question is, it depends on the type of issue the medical records address (such as medical condition, behavioral health, or drug/alcohol treatment), what state you are in, what state the records are from, and how a Prohibition on Redisclosure may be understood.
My experience is from the behavioral health field, which has more limits about which records can be redisclosed. In Colorado, many behavioral health providers only release records that they created and encourage the patient to file separate releases for other providers if they have any "third party records" they would need. I know that in my practice, many of the records that my agency received came with a Prohibition on re-disclosure attached, which also limited what could be re-disclosed.
Some resources:
- Reinhart Law has a good description specific to HIPAA and the state of Wisconsin's law.
- AHIMA's health information management resource is written in technical language but has a lot of good information.
