STAND. COM. REP. NO 637

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                

 

RE:    S.B. No. 356

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committees on Health and Commerce and Consumer Protection, to which was referred S.B. No. 356 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO HEALTH,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to enable patients to obtain their medical records free of charge from medical facilities that have declared bankruptcy.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from one individual.

 

     Your Committees find that individuals having responsibility for decisions respecting their own health care possess a concomitant right of access to complete information respecting their condition and care provided.  Allowing patients access to their medical records will not only educate patients about their medical conditions and possible treatments, it will help ensure that records are available to new care providers when patients relocate or change doctors, or when a health care provider no longer provides services.

 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by inserting an effective date of July 1, 2050, to encourage further discussion.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Commerce and Consumer Protection that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 356, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 356, S.D. 1, and be placed on the calendar for Third Reading.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Health and Commerce and Consumer Protection,

 

____________________________

ROSALYN H. BAKER, Chair

 

____________________________

JOSH GREEN, Chair