If continuousness of care for patients is to be assured, it is vital to keep good medical records, whether they are handwritten or electronic. However, there is still a huge amount of ambiguity regarding the timeline for storage of medical records and ownership of the same. There is no single guideline indicating how long a medical record needs to be preserved by hospitals in India. Every hospital has customized their own protocols for maintenance of medical records.
However, it is the need of the hour for the medical fraternity to linearize the process of maintaining medical records. In your opinion, for how long can the patient records should be stored for in-patients and out-patients? Is there any time limit for a case to be made a medicolegal case?
