You don’t have to pay a per-page fee to get your medical records from CHI Franciscan Health. CHI states that I would have to pay 39 cents per page, after a complimentary 10 pages, to get a copy of my medical records. However, you have the right to ask for an electronic copy of your medical record, and CHI cannot charge you a per-page fee. CHI can charge you the cost of the CD or USB drive, the cost of postage for the records to be mailed and the cost of transferring the information from CHI’s computer to the portable media. CHI can’t include the cost of time to search for the records, just the hourly rate of the employee doing the transferring of data and the time it took that employee to transfer the information from CHI’s computer to the portable media; the hourly rate must be reasonable. Alternatively, CHI can charge a flat fee that does not exceed $6.50.

If you provide CHI with a signed request asking for “copies of any and all of my electronic medical records including, but not limited to, radiological films, billing records and outside records,” and that the records be provided in electronic form on a CD or USB drive in the Adobe Acrobat .pdf format, and CHI charges you more than $6.50, I will help you file a complaint with the Department of Health & Human Services, Office for Civil Rights, which has repeatedly ruled against facilities regarding charges that exceed $6.50 for such a request , as it is unreasonable and in violation of HIPAA and related federal regulations.

I will leave it to others to comment on the impact to islanders of the health center closing, but price gouging islanders to get copies of their medical records as a result of the closure is not consistent with the Catholic values I grew up with.

— Barb Rhoads-Weaver

* Editor’s Note: Barb Rhoads-Weaver is an island attorney specializing in insurance and business disputes. The Beachcomber is following up and looking into the legality of these fees.