Ohioans seeking copies of their medical records often pay hospitals, doctors and other health-care providers some of the highest fees in the nation, according to aDispatch analysis.
Most states have statutes that specify the maximum amounts that can be charged for copying medical records.
In Ohio, health-care providers can charge as much as $3.07 per page for the first 10 pages of a person’s paper or electronic medical records, 64 cents for pages 11 through 50 and 26 cents for any additional pages.
While the state’s maximum rates are above-average across the board, they are especially high for smaller volumes of records.
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Of the 45 states that specify the maximum costs for copies of medical records, Ohio ranks seventh in the cost of medical records that number 10 or 25 pages, 11th for medical records that number 50 pages, and 19th for records that number 100 pages.
Ohio’s rates stand in sharp contrast to those in many other states, especially Kentucky, the only state in which the first copy of a medical record must be provided at no charge to the patient. (Additional copies cost $1 per page.)
Kentucky has the right approach, said Christine Bechtel, a coordinator with the national campaign Get My Health Data, which is working to increase consumer demand for their own medical records.
“It’s such an outdated view that patients should be charged for health data that is so essential to their care,” Bechtel said.
“We have to shift the mentality around patient health information” so it’s no longer looked at as competitive information or a line item.
A federal privacy rule allows health-care providers to impose “reasonable, cost-based fees” for providing paper copies of medical records. But the fees cannot include costs associated with searching for and retrieving the requested information.
In 2013, additional federal regulations took effect that reflected the increasingly digital nature of medical records.
They do not allow health-care providers to charge “per page” for a digital electronic record; instead, any charges can cover only labor costs and the cost of any portable medium, such as a compact disc.
Many health-care providers still default to providing paper copies, but consumers have the right to ask whether the record can be provided in another format.
Bechtel noted that 95 percent of hospitals and two-thirds of physician practices now use electronic health records.
“State laws just haven’t caught up,” she said.
And she noted that patients often aren’t told upfront how much their records will cost.
“It’s kind of the Wild West right now,” she said.
Locally, the rates that hospitals charge for copies of medical records also vary widely. Mount Carmel Health System and Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center charge the maximum rates allowed by the state, but OhioHealth’s rates are lower.
A person seeking 10 pages of medical records from OhioHealth, for example, would pay $3.60. The same request would cost $30.70 at the other two hospital systems.
Nationwide Children’s Hospital provides patients and their families a limited packet of records, including test results, discharge summaries and operative notes, free of charge. Parents seeking a complete medical record must pay the maximum fees allowed under Ohio law, according to a spokeswoman.
Sometimes, patients must pay to transfer or copy their medical records even if they’re not switching doctors.
Patients of two Mount Carmel Medical Group physicians — Melissa Harrold and Patricia Toohey — recently were notified that they would have to pay for copies of their medical records because the two physicians were leaving that medical group to join Worthington Internal Medicine, part of Central Ohio Primary Care.
There is no charge if the two doctors’ patients decide to remain with another doctor with Mount Carmel Medical Group.
HealthPort, the company under contract with Mount Carmel to copy medical records at the request of patients, told patients in a memo that the fees are necessary “due to the strict procedural and highly regulated steps involved with this process.”
Messages seeking comment were left last week for a HealthPort spokeswoman.
The transfer of patient records from one health-care provider to another is often done free of charge to ensure continuity of care, Bechtel said.
Cathy Whitmer of Grove City said she and her husband, Carl, had to pay in excess of $1,000 for copies of their son’s medical record.
Their son, Carl Whitmer Jr., died at age 30 following facial surgery at Mount Carmel West hospital, two weeks after he was seriously injured in a traffic crash.
His family sued, and won a $1.8 million jury verdict last year against the trauma doctor and his medical group, Central Ohio Surgical Associates. The case is being appealed.
Cathy Whitmer said the amount Mount Carmel West charged for her son’s medical records was “ ridiculous.”
“How do some people afford that if they need their records?” she said.
Date: November 29, 2015