REFUSING TO RELEASE A DEAD PATIENT'S MEDICAL RECORDS

A mother giving birth by cesarean section last December was given blood transfusion with the wrong blood type, and eventually died. Patient's relatives demanded the medical abstract from the hospital staff but they refused to give it allegedly for fear of crminally incriminating themselves. What is wrong here?

The Philippine Medical Association (PMA) through its current president Doctor and Attorney Bu Castro (that's no typo guys, he holds 2 postgrad degrees), was recently interviewed regarding this case.

The Philippine Medical Association (PMA) on Friday urged the management of the East Avenue Medical Center to release medical records of a patient who died last December due to alleged medical negligence.

PMA president Bu Castro said it is the group's stand that medical records be released to patients.

"We will talk to East Avenue officials to release the records. If they have nothing to hide, they should release the records," Castro said in a DZMM interview.

Reports earlier said patient Victoria Deraco, who had Type B blood, died after being transfused with Type A blood.

Lawmakers also denounced hospital officials for withholding Deraco's medical records.

Sen. Pia Cayetano said patient access to their personal medical records is part of the provisions being prepared for the Senate Patients Rights Bill.

"I think it is a patient's right to have a copy of his or her medical records. This is included in provisions being filed for legislation," she said.

She said she is opposed to the Department of Health's stand that patients could go to court should hospitals bar the release of the patient's records.

[ABS-CBN News ]

This piece of news was carried only by ABS-CBN and was largely ignored by most media outfits. Maybe they didn't think it was newsworthy enough to sell their papers.

As of this writing, I think the said hospital hasn't released the medical records yet, and using the excuse that they are waiting for the results of the Department of Health's private investigation of the matter.

My 2-cents is whether there's something maliciously wrong or not with the death of the patient, there is NO REASON at all why a hospital will refuse the release of medical records. Already, there are talks going around that the hospital would rather wait for a court order to release the records than give them voluntarily.

Maybe this discussion is more of the Sassy Lawyer's, but I can't help but feel for the anguish of the dead patient's relatives.

Oh, I forgot to mention....the baby didn't survive, too.