Modifies provisions for providing copies of medical records
HB1001 repeals and reenacts Missouri’s medical-records access statute, section 191.227, to update how patients and authorized representatives may obtain copies of health records. The bill preserves the basic right of a patient, guardian, or legally authorized representative to request records, and requires providers to furnish them within a reasonable time, subject to therapeutic limitations already recognized in current law.
The bill also revises the fee structure for record production. It sets specific maximum charges for search and retrieval, per-page copying, off-site storage retrieval, postage, and notarization, and ties those amounts to annual inflation adjustments based on the medical-care component of the CPI-U. It adds a special rule for electronic delivery when records are maintained electronically and can be produced in electronic form, and it requires the Department of Health and Senior Services to publish the adjusted fees each year. The bill further clarifies that a response stating no responsive record exists counts as a copy for purposes of the statute.
HB1001 would change Missouri law governing access to medical and mental health records by replacing the existing section 191.227 with a more detailed fee-and-disclosure framework. It affects physicians, chiropractors, hospitals, dentists, and other licensed providers, as well as patients, personal representatives, estates, attorneys, and others authorized by law to obtain records. The bill also creates a specific no-fee rule for records requested to support applications for workers’ compensation, Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Medicare, and certain veterans’ benefits, and it expands/clarifies procedures for releasing records of deceased patients.
The available context shows no recorded committee debate or votes, so there is no direct evidence of partisan or stakeholder opposition in the provided materials. Based on the bill’s content, the overall tone appears administrative and consumer-oriented: it standardizes access to records, caps fees, and adds inflation indexing and electronic-record provisions. The measure seems designed to make record requests more predictable while balancing provider cost recovery.
The main likely points of contention are the fee limits, the annual inflation adjustment mechanism, and the special treatment of electronic records. Providers may view the caps and no-fee categories as limiting cost recovery, especially for off-site storage retrieval or nonstandard duplication, while patients and advocates may favor the bill’s clearer limits and broader access. Another possible issue is the deceased-patient disclosure framework, which sets a hierarchy of eligible recipients and could raise privacy concerns or disputes among family members and estate representatives.