A call to mandate patient access to personal primary care medical records across Canada

Eighty-five percent of family physicians use an electronic medical record. Yet, despite this, clinicians other than the patients' family physicians still struggle to access medical information for patients they encounter. This is exacerbated by patients' lack of knowledge of their own medi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Canadian Medical Association journal (CMAJ) 2018-07, Vol.190 (29), p.E869-E870
Main Authors: Gorfinkel, Iris, MD, Lexchin, Joel, MD
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Access control
Access to information
Analysis
Electronic health records
Health care
Health care policy
Hospitals
Information management
Internal Medicine
Laboratories
Medical records
Patients
Patients' rights
Pharmaceutical industry
Physicians
Primary care
Primary health care
Provincial government
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Summary:Eighty-five percent of family physicians use an electronic medical record. Yet, despite this, clinicians other than the patients' family physicians still struggle to access medical information for patients they encounter. This is exacerbated by patients' lack of knowledge of their own medical conditions and treatments. A 1993 Supreme Court of Canada decision made it clear that the information in the medical record belongs to the patient, stating, "Patients have a right to see the content of their record at any time and for any reasons." Yet patients face substantial impediments to accessing their primary care charts, including having to fill in authorization forms, pay transfer fees and deal with limited primary care office hours. Efforts are ongoing to make patients' information securely available to multiple practitioners. One such effort is the Dossier sante Quebec. Canadian health care institutions are also making a start on ensuring patient access to records. MyChart is a service available in 130 countries and currently available in seven hospitals in Ontario.
ISSN:0820-3946
1488-2329
DOI:10.1503/cmaj.180522