Maintaining Control of Your Patient Records

Florida law requires physicians to maintain adequate patient records for each patient. There is no requirement that these records be stored in a paper format, so electronic records meet the requirement. However, physicians should be careful to ensure that they are able to access those records. A Florida company recently made national news when it was accused of cutting off doctors’ access to electronic patient files over a dispute relating to payment of higher tech support fees. Unfortunately, there is no current federal or state law to prevent a company from doing this. Make sure that whatever method you use for storing patient records allows you access to the records now and in the future. If you are an FMA member and have questions about this requirement, you may email fplendl@medone.org.