Philadelphia Personal Injury Attorney Blog | Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis LLP

If you believe you may be the victim of medical malpractice, Pennsylvania law gives you two years to file your claim. You may think this ample time to do some investigation on your own to determine whether or not you have a case. However, without the aid of a lawyer, there are many techniques that hospitals, doctors, and other practitioners can use to derail your investigations and prevent you from ever filing your case.

One of the most commonly used techniques by doctors and hospitals is to delay turning over your medical records. In the event of a request for records from you where a doctor or hospital knows or suspects it may be guilty of malpractice, records may easily be "misplaced." In some cases, patients have found first that records handed over were delayed for as many as five years. In other cases, the records turned over were missing key documents. Under the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), you are guaranteed access to your records, but in practical terms, doctors and hospitals often turn over only a "summary" of your records in response to your request, which may or may not contain the information you need.

If you believe you have suffered as a result of medical malpractice, it is best not to wait or attempt to investigate on your own. The experienced medical malpractice attorneys at Pomerantz, Perlberger, and Lewis, LLP know what records you need and how to get them. Contact us today for a free initial consultation and case evaluation.