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Copying patient data to Lawyers, chargeable?

Discussion in 'Practice Management' started by manmantis, Jun 9, 2011.

  1. manmantis

    manmantis Active Member


    Members do not see these Ads. Sign Up.
    An issue hot on my mind today following a conversation with a local law firm.

    We received 2 requests for copies of patient notes this week, both requested as part of insurance claims for injuries sustained elsewhere.

    One law firm asked us to notify us of our "reasonable costs", and we responded with our standard admin charge for fulfilling the request. All acceptable & no problems.

    One law firm obviously baulked at the idea of the charge & one of the partners phoned me to ask why we were charging them.

    Now, lets put this in context, we charge a paltry $20 fee for copying, postage & the time our office staff have to spend away from their usual tasks. I didn't think this at all unreasonable and it has never been questioned before.

    What do others do in this regard?

    Cheers

    Julian
     
  2. Tuckersm

    Tuckersm Well-Known Member

    Hospitals all charge for this information. It takes time and is not directly related to the clinical care of the patient. And I bet the lawyer is charging their client for asking for the information
    The link below outlines my health services charges
    http://www.easternhealth.org.au/About/foi.aspx
     
  3. The law firm will not being doing anything for free - charge them
     
  4. LuckyLisfranc

    LuckyLisfranc Well-Known Member

    Reasonable costs for standard medico-legal note requests are A$120 + GST.

    This is not a misprint.

    You may find that hard to fathom. Next time you need to engage a lawyer to write a quick email, take a phone call or meet with you for 5 minutes this is what you will be charged + more.

    Yes, its largely a photocopying exercise for your admin staff. But it requires you to ensure the information supplied is accurate and complete.

    Do not charge less than this, or the law firm will be chuckling when they receive a paltry fee for 20 bucks or so.

    Its how the world goes round, for better or worse.

    LL
     
  5. mr2pod

    mr2pod Active Member

    I am surprised they would ask for just a copy of the notes. Normally they would ask for a written report, which then requires your time etc and can therefore be charged at a much more respectable value eg. LL's $120 + GST
     
  6. LuckyLisfranc

    LuckyLisfranc Well-Known Member

    No, the trend in the past few years is to rarely request a written report.

    All they want is a copy of the notes the majority of the time (much cheaper).

    LL
     
  7. Ideology

    Ideology Active Member

    Charge the fee recommended by LL.
    Also be very careful that you have the signed permission of the patient. This is sensitive information under the Privacy Act and lawyers do not have a right to it. The only people who do have a right are the patient in the record, a Court order and depending on the circumstances a Policeman investigating a crime. I have had practices recieve requests from lawyers acting against your patient.
     
  8. Ideology

    Ideology Active Member

    Also be wary about sending your notes. I would not recommend this as they may not always say things in the way that you might prefer them to be said and others may place a different interpretation on them. I knew a medical specialist a long time ago who used to write FITH Syndrome in Px notes. Very dangerous.
     
  9. manmantis

    manmantis Active Member

    Thanks for that. Good to know we weren't being unreasonable with our usual practice.

    Interestingly we charge $120+ for medical reports, but only $20 for copying/forwarding. Might have to re-visit that, although I now know at least one lawyer who won't be happy. If $20 was too much he'll have a coronary at $120!

    No notes are released without a signed patient consent to do so.

    Our office staff send a full English (ie. no abbreviations) summary of the notes in addition to a direct copy of the patient file. This isn't as necessary as it was when we used hand-written notes, but as abbreviations still exist we still do this anyway. I have found that this is preferable to sending a copy of our accepted abbreviations list, since we used to still get calls asking us to explain things. Now our office staff copy/paste from the notes and alter abbreviations to full phrases. No more than 5-10 mins work.

    And we don't use any non-PC abbreviations. I've seen some doozies in my time in medical records and know far better than to go down that route.

    Cheers
     
  10. Ideology

    Ideology Active Member

    Here are the hourly rates charged for a middle tier law firm.
    Partner $460.00
    Special Counsel/Consultant $420.00
    Senior Associate $390.00
    Senior Lawyer $320.00
    Lawyer $290.00
    Junior Lawyer $250.00
    Law clerk/Paralegal $190.00
    Fax local $1.20 per page
    Fax STD $2.40 per page
    Fax IDD $3.60 per page
    Mobile phone At cost
    STD & IDD Calls At Cost
    Photocopying $0.65 per page
    Colour copying $2.00 per page
     
  11. LuckyLisfranc

    LuckyLisfranc Well-Known Member

    Standard fees for GPs who provide a medico-legal report without re-examination of the patient are in the vicinty of $400. For specialists its about $700.

    LL
     
  12. Ideology

    Ideology Active Member

    Practices vary such a lot in how they handle things like this. Most like yours have got it sorted. Another way is to establish an hourly rate based on your operating costs plus margin for profit.
     
  13. manmantis

    manmantis Active Member

    We charge $120 + $80 per additional page. Don't often do more than a page or two, so $400-700 seems a high bar from where we are.

    Interestingly though, in those cases where we charge the health funds for patient reports the rebate is usually quite generous.

    I suspect that the local country town law firms aren't so accustomed to the charges outlined in this thread. You big city folk have deeper pockets! ;)

    The lawyer phoned me again today, grumpy old git that he is. Still grumbling about the $20 fee. I suspect he's logging the time spent talking to me so that he can charge someone more to make him feel better. C'mon, $20!!
     
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