Arizona Providers and Requests for Medical Records Class Action

Patients who want to file personal injury cases are likely to need their medical records. If so, they will request them from their healthcare providers. The complaint for this class action cites two problems that come up in this situation: (1) when the records are sent to attorneys, the medical records parties may bill the attorneys for the records; or (2) the medical records parties may refuse to provide part or all of the medical records to the patient unless the records are requested by an attorney.

The class is defined as two subclasses:

• Subclass 1 is (a) personal injury law firms similarly situated to the plaintiff firms in this case, to which individuals request their medical records be sent, (b) where the personal injury firms are billed for the medical record requests they did not make.
• Subclass 2 is (a) individuals similarly situated to the plaintiff individuals in this case, who request their own medical records from healthcare providers, (b) whose the healthcare providers refuse to provide them with part or all of their medical records after having received a request from those who qualify for Subclass 1.

The defendants in this case are a large group of medical providers or record holders. A sampling includes Medicopy Services, Inc.; American Medical Response of Maricopa, LLC; Mayo Clinic Arizona; Ciox Health, LLC, doing business as IOD Incorporated; Hospital Development of West Phoenix, Inc. doing business as Abrazo West Campus; Yuma Regional Medical Center; Orthopedic Specialists of North America, PLLC, doing business as OrthoArizona; and Record Reproduction Services, LLC.

The complaint calls it “common practice” for patients who are making personal injury claims against another entity (“patients/claimants”) to ask that their medical records be sent to the law firms that represent them. The patient/claimant is therefore the requesting party, but the complaint alleges that the medical providers often send the invoice to the law firms rather than the patient/claimants who are making the request.

This is the problem for Subclass 1. The complaint points out that the requests for patient records are coming from the patients themselves and not from the law firms: “The members of [Subclass 1] did not enter into any agreement or make any requests of” the healthcare providers who hold the records.

Sometimes, the complaint alleges, when patient/claimants ask a medical provider for their own records and ask that the records be sent to a law firm representing them, the medical providers may refuse to provide the full medical records.

This is the problem for Subclass 2. The complaint provides an example of a man going to his son’s provider and asking for his son’s medical records. The provider gave him incomplete records, the complaint alleges. When he went back to get complete records, the complaint claims, he was told that his attorney must request the records in order for a complete copy to be provided.

Article Type: Lawsuit
Topic: medical
Tags: Providing Medical Records, Unlawful Charges for Medical/Health Records