Having hard copies of your records ensure that no detail is left out. The process can be somewhat lengthy and occasionally frustrating, but the investment in your oral health is worth it.
Knowing whether your records need to be sent in paper or digital form will save you headaches down the road. Contact your old dental office and inform them that you would like to transfer your records to your new dentist. Let them know whether you would like the records to be sent either digitally or via mail. At this point, your old dentist will most likely require you to sign a release that demonstrates your consent for the records to be transferred.
You may also be asked to pay a fee that covers the cost of copies, postage, and mailing supplies involved in transferring the records. If there is any doubt about what the patient has consented for you to release, contact the patient or the new dentist for clarification.
Yes, the patient can pick up copies of their dental records from your office or request that they be forwarded by registered mail or courier to their home. The patient can indicate this in advance with their signed consent. Dentists are required by law to keep records. Patients are entitled to diagnostic quality duplicate radiographs on film, photographic paper or appropriate digital formats.
Patients are also entitled to duplicate study models or equivalent diagnostic quality digital images of them. Digital images can be provided on removable media or by secure e-mail with strong encryption. While many dentists will provide copies of dental records at no charge as a courtesy to their patients, a dentist can charge a fee consistent with the direct costs incurred in duplicating and releasing them.
This may include mailing costs, charges from a dental laboratory or radiograph duplicating facility, and materials costs. In most cases, a parent can request and obtain copies of the dental records for children who are under the age of 16 years. While a patient may request copies of the dental records for a spouse or a child 16 and over, the dentist will require the consent of these individuals to release their records. The release and transfer of dental records should be accomplished within one to two weeks of receipt of the request.
Whether this is possible may depend on the number and type of dental records requested and whether the services of an outside duplication facility for dental radiographs and study models are required. It is unacceptable to withhold the transfer of records because of an outstanding account balance.
College regulations must be followed, regardless of a financial dispute between a patient and a dentist. Patients are entitled to seek care with other dental health care providers and dentists must provide copies of the dental records as requested by the patients. In such cases, the original dental records should be sent directly from dentist to dentist by courier and, after consultation and treatment, the original dental records should be returned to the dentist who lent them.
These routine tasks can include the review of patient demographics and identification, their health history, and entries in progress notes. Other notations regarding information such as telephone conversations, missed appointments, and failures to follow directions must be included under the concept of complete records. The law is meant to protect patient privacy while health information is being shared among providers and insurance companies. Any violations in these policies must be documented and reported according to the law and procedures set forth by the dental office.
While the whole dental team has a role in compliance, the dentist is ultimately responsible for enforcement. There are two major focuses, portability and accountability, covered in four basic sets of HIPAA standards. The first HIPAA standard, titled Transaction and Code Sets, requires dental procedure terminology and their corresponding insurance code numbers to be standardized for all of dentistry and dental-related procedures.
Dentistry currently follows the codes provided in the American Dental Association publication titled Current Dental Terminology , or CDT, which is usually updated biannually. This change was intended to streamline the process of creating a claim and also processing the claim by via insurance companies. However, any dental office intending to file with Medicaid must submit all claims in electronic format. Each provider must name a Privacy Officer and must prepare a written policy.
This policy must be offered to every patient and posted in the office. When received, the patient must sign a document that they have received the policy so the office can document compliance. The third standard is the Security Rule. Security in this case refers to protecting the confidentiality and integrity of the record while always knowing the location of the record for retrieval.
Each type of information should require a necessity to access it, often via a protected password or pass-phrase. Additionally, some states have a set proscribed fee for record copy and transfer under their laws. Regardless, charging patients an excessive processing fee for record copies is expressly prohibited under federal HIPAA statutes. In fact, many healthcare providers deliver this service for gratis in the interest of patient welfare.
Unfortunately, some do not. In fact, failure to forward patient records upon patient request in a timely manner is a very common complaint received and reviewed by state dental boards.
In many states, this violation goes beyond federal HIPAA rules and regulations and specifically into state administrative codes. State regulators under state dental boards impact dental licensure standings. Further, a few state dental boards also regulate non-dentist owners of dental practices. Such dental board complaints extend from solo practioners to isolated group practices and into certain dental service organizations DSOs.
These practitioners are often placed in a difficult position, especially if they are a credentialed Medicaid or preferred provider organization PPO doctor.
This may be financially untenable in clinics with tight operational budgets. Patients might be required to pay out-of-pocket for current images, even though recent images are theoretically available from a previous provider. As too often happens, the newest provider may limp along with inadequate diagnostic records and images, and an incomplete treatment plan, until plan policies remunerate for updated records and images.
Rules and regulations are meaningless without vigorous enforcement. In fact, failure of enforcement of statutes generally enables and promotes lawlessness. Neither healthcare group admitted wrongdoing. Each is required to spend the time, effort, and expense of compliance with a formal Corrective Action Plan.
Many organizations have been advising the dental profession about patient rights relating to the transfer of dental records since the passage of the federal HIPAA statutes in This includes the federal government , the ADA , state dental boards , and state dental associations.
Until recently in Florida, few alleged violations of consequence have been prosecuted. Ignorance of these laws will offer offenders a poor legal defense. Finally, patient rights relating to transfer of their healthcare records are today being enforced with a vigor and emphasis not witnessed previously.
Davis practices general dentistry in Santa Fe, NM.
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