You know well that the hospital has to keep your medical records confidential. You have protections under the law, so your doctor can’t tell a third party without your consent. This is private information, and while anyone is allowed to ask you for that information, they cannot seek it from your medical provider without getting consent first.
But what about your doctor? Maybe you are worried that you have experienced medical malpractice. Perhaps you’re thinking about going to your doctor for a procedure and you don’t know how often they’ve done it. Can the hospital hide your doctor’s record from you, or is this public information?
Hospitals may try to keep records secret
The hospital should tell you about your doctor’s record, but they may be wary of doing so. They don’t want to develop a reputation for having a problematic physician on staff. That would harm the reputation not just of the doctor but of the hospital as an entire entity.
In some cases, this leads to doctors switching states. For instance, a doctor may have been disciplined by the medical board in one state, meaning they can no longer practice because of mistakes or the malpractice they committed. But this may not be transferred to another state, so they’ll switch to a different location and begin working again. This could lead you to think they have an immaculate record when they do not.
There could also be related problems if the medical board doesn’t issue the necessary discipline. Maybe your doctor made errors that didn’t result in a lawsuit, so you can’t see the results of that lawsuit, but you still want to know what their record looks like. If the medical board is acting as if nothing occurred and the doctor made no violations, you’re going to think you’re in better hands than you are.
What options do you have?
If you’ve been harmed by a doctor or suffered from medical malpractice, you must know what legal options you have. This is especially true if the hospital attempts to cover up the doctor’s record or keep other important information from you.
