Question on Medical Records

[cwb]

Hey everyone, I'm an M1 and posted this question on the allo board but I am not getting responses and figured you all would know more about the topic anyway. I have to write a report on physician's access to patient records and have been finding a ton of stuff on HIPAA etc... but none really addressing my particular situation.

Basically my group has an infant presenting with hyperflexible fingers, height in 98th percentile, few other signs that point to Marfan's. Genetics consultation was inconclusive but from what I gather that doesn't necessarily mean anything for Marfan's. So that leaves us looking to family history but the biological father has left the state and therefore permission see his records is not granted. So in closing my question is - as a physician is there anything that you would be able to do to get access to his records? I thought I read something about getting a subpoena but it wasn't very clear as to when this could be used. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I have kind of hit a wall.

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[D50W]

If this was an ethics question on the boards, I would say there is no way physician can get the father's record. The father's right to privacy prevails, especially since the child's condition is not immediately life threatening. The best available option might be to try and track down the father and get his consent to view the record.

Any other opinions? Any loopholes in this argument?

 

[flighterdoc]

If this was an ethics question on the boards, I would say there is no way physician can get the father's record. The father's right to privacy prevails, especially since the child's condition is not immediately life threatening. The best available option might be to try and track down the father and get his consent to view the record.

Any other opinions? Any loopholes in this argument?

No, that seems to be about it. All you can do is ask the father for his history (and ask nicely, if you start off with talk of legal compunction, you won't get much).