The fundamental policy issue I am asking Virginia to consider is whether a childhood medical record should be permitted to be destroyed simply because a patient has reached a particular age, when that information may remain medically relevant for the remainder of that person’s life.

There is a substantial difference between a medical record being old and a medical record being medically obsolete.

Advances in genetics, metabolic medicine, neurology, immunology, rheumatology, oncology, infectious disease, and other fields continue to reveal the importance of historical clinical information that may previously have appeared nonspecific or unexplained.

Preserving childhood medical records for a longer, defined period would protect the ability of patients to access their own medical histories, support continuity of care, improve the availability of longitudinal information for future diagnosis, and preserve information that may become medically significant only after scientific knowledge has advanced.

For these reasons, I respectfully request that the Commonwealth reconsider the current minimum retention period for childhood medical records and adopt a longer, modernized standard.