GP of over 30 years closing up and wont give me my records/is delaying in doing so

Webby5

I showed up on Friday to see my GP's offices upheaved with no PCs in place that I could see and him packing up the remains of his belongings. I was told he hadnt got access to my medical files because of this.

He then informed me that my next GP could write to him for them! He said all mail to his soon to be ex offices was being re-directed to his home for the next two months.

I am incensed!

I am with this GP for over 30 years and we had an outstanding medical matter he was to follow up on (blood tests). Does my new GP have to ask the hospital for the results now or will I have to have them redone?

Where do I stand legally on this?

Who governs Irish GPs?

I was aware my GP was selling up but not aware that it had been sold. The last time we talked (about 3 months ago) he said he was struggling to sell it and he would be in contact with all patients once it had gone through.

He tells me on Friday that there was “no way he could contact two thousand people”. Now I know for a fact he hadn't got this many patients left. Id guess it was it was in the low hundreds.

What was he LEGALLY obliged to do? Surely he had to write to us all and tell us the sale had gone through and we had a certain amount of weeks to get our files?

As he is now an ex GP will any governing body have any impact on this? And if they wont what is the best course of action to take?

Im told tomorrow is his last day on the premises and I want to call him first thing in the morning armed with facts on what I can legally do going forward if he doesnt hand over my files.

He also said when he does up my records that:

1) He will be charging all patients 20 euros for them, and
2) He will be doing up the “highlights” only for the next GP to look at. That is; a few pages rather than everything.

Ive 30 years plus of records with this man, isnt he obliged to release everything to me?

Sorry for the long post. Advice seriously needed on this before tomorrow morning.

Thanks

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

Webby5

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Jesus.

Backseat modding? Is it 1999 again? Nothing else to do on a Sunday?

Ive seen plenty of good replies to serious matters on AH and I wanted any input from those on Legal Discussion too. Anyway, your childishness has got its way and the AH thread is no more.

All advice from others appreciated on this one.

kneemos

My records are kept in a brown folder in the filing cabinet.
Why would he remove these if there's another doctor taking over?

Zaph

Enough of the righteous indignation please. We don't permit people to start the same thread in multiple forums, so Fred Swanson was merely stating site rules. You can choose to keep this one or the one in Health Sciences, but not both, so please let me know which one I can close.

Webby5

kneemos wrote: »

My records are kept in a brown folder in the filing cabinet.
Why would he remove these if there's another doctor taking over?

There's not unfortunately. The buyer isnt a GP.

kneemos

Webby5 wrote: »

There's not unfortunately. The buyer isnt a GP.

They're obliged to hand over files when requested AFAIK.
Charging for admin is probably up to himself.

Kristopherus

Webby5 wrote: »

There's not unfortunately. The buyer isnt a GP.

Have you a Medical Card? If so, you contact your local HSE office who will guide you.

Webby5

Kristopherus wrote: »

Have you a Medical Card? If so, you contact your local HSE office who will guide you.

I dont unfortunately.

Are these people the governing body for GPs? I cant post URLs as a new user so www (dot) medicalcouncil (dot) ie

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

Gael23

I've been following this in Health Sciences.
He can't get away with this OP. He is obliged to hold a copy of your notes for 8 years under data protection, regardless of this you are entitled to receive a copy of your notes if you wish.
I would be taking this up with the Medical Council.

Webby5

Gael23 wrote: »

I've been following this in Health Sciences.
He can't get away with this OP. He is obliged to hold a copy of your notes for 8 years under data protection, regardless of this you are entitled to receive a copy of your notes if you wish.
I would be taking this up with the Medical Council.

Thanks. The fact that he's retiring means he doesnt seem to give two fcuks about anything the Council might do to him though.

Is there anyone else I should be contacting apart from them? Im thinking a solicitor at this stage to sue.

Gongoozler

The Medical Council cannot get your records for you so I'd recommend not bothering to waste your time there. Plus, if he's retiring he may be coming off the register anyway and so the Medical Council cannot take a complaint against him.

You should contact the data protection commissioners office on that. But in my experience they have very little control over what the doctor ultimately decides to do. You are generally entitled to a copy of your medical records, and as far as I know, he can't charge you for that.

A solicitor would be your best bet after the data protection commissioner.

Pat Mustard

Webby5 wrote: »

Advice seriously needed on this before tomorrow morning.

A solicitor is unlikely to be able to resolve this in a few days, in my view.

Your current doctor is selling up. Therefore you need a new doctor. So maybe you should consider doing that rather than going to a solicitor.

The other thing is that a summarised medical history can be more useful than a large bundle of old records. So maybe consider talking to a new GP about getting the records handed over as soon as possible. I would imagine that the new doctor would be able to pick up the phone to the old doctor and find out about the blood tests, etc.

kneemos

Pat Mustard wrote: »

A solicitor is unlikely to be able to resolve this in a few days, in my view.

Your current doctor is selling up. Therefore you need a new doctor. So maybe you should consider doing that rather than going to a solicitor.

The other thing is that a summarised medical history can be more useful than a large bundle of old records. So maybe consider talking to a new GP about getting the records handed over as soon as possible. I would imagine that the new doctor would be able to pick up the phone to the old doctor and find out about the blood tests, etc.

Test results are computerised and are available to the HSE I think.
Your notes,dosages and the like I don't know.

Peregrinus

Webby5 wrote: »

Thanks. The fact that he's retiring means he doesnt seem to give two fcuks about anything the Council might do to him though.

Is there anyone else I should be contacting apart from them?

Your new GP, who can ask your old GP to pass on the medical records.

I don't know whether there is any legal or professional obligation to pass on the records, but this strikes me as much cheaper, and much more likely to succeed, than instructing a solicitor.

schemingbohemia

Surely your GP has already provided you with the solution, when you get your new GP s/he will ask your old GP for the files and send them on. What's the problem?

haveringchick

GPs retire or just leave all the time , and patients move home, move county, move country even, or just change to another GP without all this hysteria.
OP you were not garanteed a GP for life. Your priority should be securing a suitable GP for the future, who will arrange to have your notes transferred.
Incidentally, you were going to instruct a solicitor to sue, for what, retiring?

Miaireland

OP as far as I am aware it is standard practice that one GP requests your notes from your old GP rather than your old GP giving them to you. Your new GP will probably ask you to sign a form requesting that they be releases to him/her. He or she will then send it to your old GP. AFAIK your old GP needs this release form before he can give out your notes. It is also quite common for them to send a summary than the entire notes. Your new GP might need to know you had a cut to the head ten years ago but probably will not need to know that you had four stictches and was told to take paracatmol if you were in pain.

You have no case to sue (I have no idea on what bases you were even thinking of) so save your money and your solicitors time.

Mr. Incognito

I am sorry but, seriously.

How DARE your doctor retire and inconvenience you. FFS

You need to grow the hell up. He is a human being doing a job. He is not your indentured slave.

You are harrassing an old man for what, blood tests? Get a new GP, request it in the normal way.

You are not being affected by a few days delay. Cop on.

People are so ignorant these days.

Maybe you should buy him a retirement card or a present for what appears to be at least 30 years of loyal service to his patients besides becoming "incensed and suing him".

gizmo555

Webby5 wrote: »

Ive 30 years plus of records with this man, isnt he obliged to release everything to me?

Yes, if you make a request under the Data Protection Acts.

If you do, the maximum you can be charged is €6.35 and you must get the requested records within 40 days. See here for more information:

http://dataprotection.ie/docs/Making-an-Access-Request/963.htm

endacl

gizmo555 wrote: »

Yes, if you make a request under the Data Protection Acts.

If you do, the maximum you can be charged is €6.35 and you must get the requested records within 40 days. See here for more information:

http://dataprotection.ie/docs/Making-an-Access-Request/963.htm

Alternatively, of course, OP could use the valuable experience to go into the molehill landscaping business.

gizmo555

endacl wrote: »

Alternatively, of course, OP could use the valuable experience to go into the molehill landscaping business.

I'm having trouble understanding why you and several other posters think it's so strange that the OP should want to exercise his right to get full and timely access to his medical records. This is the responsibility of the retiring GP and no-one else.

NUTLEY BOY

Mr. Incognito wrote: »

I am sorry but, seriously.

How DARE your doctor retire and inconvenience you. FFS

You need to grow the hell up. He is a human being doing a job. He is not your indentured slave.

You are harrassing an old man for what, blood tests? Get a new GP, request it in the normal way.

You are not being affected by a few days delay. Cop on.

People are so ignorant these days.

Maybe you should buy him a retirement card or a present for what appears to be at least 30 years of loyal service to his patients besides becoming "incensed and suing him".

Sorry, that is just not good enough.

OP, as a patient, is fully entitled to receive proper professional treatment from the GP and he is equally obliged to conduct his practice likewise. The fact that he is winding up the practice does not entitle him to bring the working relationship to a shabby end.

Mr. Incognito

NUTLEY BOY wrote: »

Sorry, that is just not good enough.

OP, as a patient, is fully entitled to receive proper professional treatment from the GP and he is equally obliged to conduct his practice likewise. The fact that he is winding up the practice does not entitle him to bring the working relationship to a shabby end.

I will think you will find that it does.

Retirement is never easy. You will always have patients who will require further treatment. The answer is, Sorry. I am retiring on X date and your files will be handed off to X and released to your new GP on request.

The alternative is to never retire but to phase out your patients. At the end it'll be you and Bridie in the Surgery hanging around for your one patient.

A patient is not ENTITLED (Hate that word. HATE it) to anything other than the doctors care to the best of his ability, which he has given for 30 years.

Blood tests are a minor result to be kicking up such a fuss.

You need a dose of cop on and dare I say it to consider the world from the doctors perspective for five minutes.

He is retiring. That's the end of relationship. Good bye. Stick what you think you are "entitled" to.

gizmo555

Mr. Incognito wrote: »

He is retiring. That's the end of relationship.

Not according to the Irish College of General Practitioners:

When a single handed GP ceases practice due to retirement or death and no GP is due to take over the practice, the retiring GP (or executor in the case of the medical practitioner being deceased) should take prompt and reasonable steps to notify patients and allow them the opportunity to transfer their medical records to another provider. If any patient cannot be contacted or does not respond, within a reasonable period, the medical practitioner (or executor) should maintain the records with due safeguards for a period of eight years and then securely destroy them.

http://www.icgp.ie/go/in_the_practice/information_technology/data_protection

JohnBee

gizmo555 wrote: »

Not according to the Irish College of General Practitioners:

When a single handed GP ceases practice due to retirement or death and no GP is due to take over the practice, the retiring GP (or executor in the case of the medical practitioner being deceased) should take prompt and reasonable steps to notify patients and allow them the opportunity to transfer their medical records to another provider. If any patient cannot be contacted or does not respond, within a reasonable period, the medical practitioner (or executor) should maintain the records with due safeguards for a period of eight years and then securely destroy them.

http://www.icgp.ie/go/in_the_practice/information_technology/data_protection

Yes, sounds like the GP already did that with three months notice.

As before, avoid yourself, and everyone else a lot of bother and do what you are going to do anyway, get a new GP and get them to get any previous relevant records.

If every patient of the GP stamped their feet unreasonably, the GP would never retire. Thankfully most patients dont threaten to sue.

NUTLEY BOY

Mr. Incognito wrote: »

I will think you will find that it does.

Retirement is never easy. You will always have patients who will require further treatment. The answer is, Sorry. I am retiring on X date and your files will be handed off to X and released to your new GP on request.

The alternative is to never retire but to phase out your patients. At the end it'll be you and Bridie in the Surgery hanging around for your one patient.

A patient is not ENTITLED (Hate that word. HATE it) to anything other than the doctors care to the best of his ability, which he has given for 30 years.

Blood tests are a minor result to be kicking up such a fuss.

You need a dose of cop on and dare I say it to consider the world from the doctors perspective for five minutes.

He is retiring. That's the end of relationship. Good bye. Stick what you think you are "entitled" to.

Essential and practical points taken ! I am not suggesting that the winding up of the practice needs to be akin to the winding up of a company in terms of strict formality. However, as gizmo555 points out there are requirements in relation to records.

BTW, for some people, blood test results are not minor matters even where the end result is nothing abnormal detected.

In relation to your advice to "cop on" is there any chance of confining yourself to the actual issue ? i.e. play the ball not the man :

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

JohnBee

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

But the GP has not trumped the law of the land. Patients are entitled to request their medical records directly, or via freedom of information act. The most useful practice however is for transfer between doctors.

The doctor in this case has not denied anything to the patient.

endacl

JohnBee wrote: »

But the GP has not trumped the law of the land. Patients are entitled to request their medical records directly, or via freedom of information act. The most useful practice however is for transfer between doctors.

The doctor in this case has not denied anything to the patient.

I have a sneaking suspicion this thread is about €20 worth of misplaced indignation..

jjC123

All your patient files will be on a centralized system so your new GP should have all of them. I imagine the summary is just for the sake of the new GP so he/she can get an overview of your health (something I doubt that your GP had to do) The original files are the property of your doctor (I think) and you can request a copy. I imagine that the admin work for a retiring GP is colossal with patient files, ongoing cases, selling the practise etc. so a delay doesn't seem unreasonable.


Also, a full time GP would definitely have over 1000 registered patients. You'd see the low hundreds in the space of a fortnight.

Gongoozler

jjC123 wrote: »

All your patient files will be on a centralized system

The original files are the property of your doctor (I think)

Wrong and wrong.

Gael23

In the situation I found myself in last year, my notes were transferred to another practice but I was not happy to attend there and did get a copy of my files but it took several weeks. I have quite an impressive medical history so i just prepared a few pages of summary to tie me over with my new GP

jjC123

Gongoozler wrote: »

Wrong and wrong.

Common practise among GPs now is to use Healthlink which would make you files available to your new GP.

And the original hard copy of medical records are hospital/doctors property. A copy can be requested of course, you're entitled to all of the information in your records but the original files won't be given to you.

Gongoozler

jjC123 wrote: »

Common practise among GPs now is to use Healthlink which would make you files available to your new GP.

And the original hard copy of medical records are hospital/doctors property. A copy can be requested of course, you're entitled to all of the information in your records but the original files won't be given to you.

Never heard of healthlink. Fair enough if it's true.

The medical records are not the property of the clinic or hospital or doctor. They are legally considered the property of the patient. The only time, legally, they can be refused to you (and they can be by the way) is if it would be deemed to put you or someone else at risk by doing so. It is your data, and they are yours. Of course, the vast majority of the time, you'll be given a copy, because whoever is giving the copy usually needs to keep a copy themselves.

Nichard Dixon

jjC123 wrote: »

Common practise among GPs now is to use Healthlink which would make you files available to your new GP.

And the original hard copy of medical records are hospital/doctors property. A copy can be requested of course, you're entitled to all of the information in your records but the original files won't be given to you.

You can request a copy and require that the originals be destroyed, so saying that the records are the doctor's property is a moot point.

davo10

Gongoozler wrote: »

Never heard of healthlink. Fair enough if it's true.

The medical records are not the property of the clinic or hospital or doctor. They are legally considered the property of the patient. The only time, legally, they can be refused to you (and they can be by the way) is if it would be deemed to put you or someone else at risk by doing so. It is your data, and they are yours. Of course, the vast majority of the time, you'll be given a copy, because whoever is giving the copy usually needs to keep a copy themselves.

You are wrong and wrong.

Charts can be uploaded to healthlink to allow for remote access and easy transfer between GP's and specialists/hospitals.

The charts are the property of the Doctor/clinic however the patient is entitled to a copy. The GP keeps the originals for medico legal reasons, all X-rays /notes/results can be copied.

€6.55 buys you a copy of your notes but film x-rays have to be sent to a specialist copying company and the additional cost will be borne by the patient.

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

gctest50

davo10 wrote: »

.........

Charts can be uploaded to healthlink to allow for remote access and easy transfer between GP's and specialists/hospitals.
.

,

davo10

Fred Swanson wrote: »

Not all GPs use this.

Correct and I doubt someone who is retiring would be bothered doing it. The days of the country/town GP working alone in a musty old surgery are drawing to an end, most single hand clinics are closing when the GP retires, like many other service providers, GPs now tend to operate in group practices and as a result the retirement of a GP means the files pass to an existing colleague or a new replacement who provide continuity of care. The ops situation still occurs frequently but in another decade it will be rare as single GP practices are phased out.

Right now the GP must archive the files for 8 years and keep his indemnity in place in case of a claim. The ops new GP can simply request a copy of the chart from the old GP, honestly this is no great hardship for anyone involved, it allows to old GP to copy files as requested rather than copying thousands in one go. Incidentally, patient numbers will be in the thousands, possibly tens of thousands as each patient, even if they only visited once with swollen tonsils 10 years ago, will have a chart. It is not unusual for a GP to have charts for 4 generations of the same family, that family alone night run to 50 patients including parents, kids, kids of kids etc

Uno my Uno.

What a load of fuss over nothing.

A doctor is not required to produce any patient's file on the spot like rabbit from a magian's hat. Whats more it would not be sensible, practical or secure for GPs to do so. What the doctor is required to do is forward a patient's records to the new GP or the patient himself in a timely manner and the OP's GP has undertaken to do this so there is simply no issue arising other than that the OP has taken offense at the GP's refusal to pander to him.

Quite why the OP is so indignant I do not understand, as to what he intends to Sue the GP for I am mystified.

gizmo555

davo10 wrote: »

€6.55 buys you a copy of your notes but film x-rays have to be sent to a specialist copying company and the additional cost will be borne by the patient.

€6.35 is the maximum that can be charged if the request is made under the terms of the Data Protection Act, regardless of the actual cost of locating the information and producing the copy. This includes image data such as x-rays and other diagnostic images, as well as CCTV recordings.

davo10

gizmo555 wrote: »

€6.35 is the maximum that can be charged if the request is made under the terms of the Data Protection Act, regardless of the actual cost of locating the information and producing the copy. This includes image data such as x-rays and other diagnostic images, as well as CCTV recordings.

No it is not, copying a film x-ray to the standard required for diagnostics is highly specialised, it is not like burning a digital/video to a disc. I can assure you it is expensive and not covered by the €6.35, for €6.35 you can have a standard photocopy of the x-ray which will be utterly useless.

gizmo555

davo10 wrote: »

No it is not, copying a film x-ray to the standard required for diagnostics is highly specialised, it is not like burning a digital/video to a disc. I can assure you it is expensive and not covered by the €6.35, for €6.35 you can have a standard photocopy of the x-ray which will be utterly useless.

You're missing the point. It doesn't matter how expensive it is, the cost cannot be passed on to the patient. If the request is made under the Data Protection Acts, no more than €6.35 can be charged. And if the "copy" provided doesn't contain the full information that's in the original, it wouldn't be a true copy, to which the patient is entitled.

There is an exemption to the right of access, if providing the copy would involve "disproportionate" effort, but this exemption has been very narrowly interpreted by the Data Protection Commissioner.

Uno my Uno.

gizmo555 wrote: »

You're missing the point. It doesn't matter how expensive it is, the cost cannot be passed on to the patient. If the request is made under the Data Protection Acts, no more than €6.35 can be charged. And if the "copy" provided doesn't contain the full information that's in the original, it wouldn't be a true copy, to which the patient is entitled.

There is an exemption to the right of access, if providing the copy would involve "disproportionate" effort, but this exemption has been very narrowly interpreted by the Data Protection Commissioner.

I would suggest that it could certainly be argued that being required to provide hundreds of euros worth of X-ray or scan films at a cost of E6.35purely for a patient's own records would be disproportionate.

myshirt

I had a similar problem with my GP a number of years ago, and when I complained he said I was '€2 million euros too late'. In other words, as I understand it, he'd made his money; he'd drank his money; and his pension fund was adequately funded and in trust.

It was like Father Fintan Stack telling me he'd just drove my car into a big wall and what the f%ck was I gonna do about it.

gctest50

Uno my Uno. wrote: »

I would suggest that it could certainly be argued that being required to provide hundreds of euros worth of X-ray or scan films at a cost of E6.35purely for a patient's own records would be disproportionate.

they should be digitised anyway - since they just love stop-gaps here move to a bit of computed radiography

gizmo555

Uno my Uno. wrote: »

I would suggest that it could certainly be argued that being required to provide hundreds of euros worth of X-ray or scan films at a cost of E6.35purely for a patient's own records would be disproportionate.

Incurring costs of hundreds of euros to respond to an access request would not be at all unusual.

JohnBee

gizmo555 wrote: »

Incurring costs of hundreds of euros to respond to an access request would not be at all unusual.

So if all indignant patients did the same, do you think it would be reasonable to bankrupt the doctor?

Fact is, the OP should become god because of their ability to create mountains.

gizmo555

JohnBee wrote: »

So if all indignant patients did the same, do you think it would be reasonable to bankrupt the doctor?

Whether it's reasonable or not, and contrary to what some posters have claimed, in response to a valid access request the doctor must provide a full and accurate copy of patient records within 40 days and cannot charge more than €6.35. That's what the law is. (This is the legal discussion forum, after all!)

Of course, in practice only a very small minority of patients will ever make such an access request, so to suggest the doctor risks bankruptcy is nonsense. But the bottom line is that anyone processing personal data assumes the legal obligations and responsibilities that go with it. This is one of them.

JohnBee wrote: »

Fact is, the OP should become god because of their ability to create mountains.

Again, it beats me why so many posters regard the OP wanting to exercise his right to a copy of his medical records as being so extraordinary.