Changes to retirement of medical records

PENSACOLA, FL, UNITED STATES

04.22.2014

Courtesy Story

NMRTC Pensacola

By Lt. James Lagger
division officer,
Outpatient Records
Naval Hospital Pensacola

PENSACOLA, Fla. - In January, the process to officially retire medical service treatment records (STR) for service members who are retiring or separating from the military changed dramatically.

In an effort to both streamline communications with the Department of Veterans Affairs and ultimately improve VA claim processing times, a fleet wide message mandated that a service member’s entire paper-based medical and dental health record will now be electronically scanned and uploaded into the Health Artifact and Image Management Solution (HAIMS) to create a fully electronic STR accessible by the VA. Naval Hospital Pensacola and its branch clinics are working hard to implement this process to better serve its beneficiaries.

This change is critically important for service members who are stationed with operational units that maintain medical or dental records within their respective units. The medical point of contact at each unit should ensure that a process is in place to ensure STR documentation is provided to NHP or one of its branch clinic’s Medical Records Departments for official scanning to the VA. Additionally, if service members have obtained their original medical record by mistake and have it in their possession they need to return it to their local records department to have it properly retired electronically to the VA. The VA is no longer accepting paper medical records to process veteran claims, so it is critical that those documents are retired properly.

With these changes, service members who are departing the armed services are strongly encouraged to request a complete personal copy of their STR for their records. A copy can be obtained at the Medical Records Office or Department of the Military Treatment Facility that provides their care.

Service members with questions can contact NHP’s Patient Administration Department at 850-505-6214.

• Date Taken: 04.22.2014
• Date Posted: 04.22.2014 08:56
• Story ID: 127042
• Location: PENSACOLA, FL, US