How Medical Records Can Save Your Life

A few years ago, my then-73-year-old father was rushed to the hospital after my mother noticed that something was "just not right." He had heart bypass surgery only a few weeks before.

By the time I arrived at the hospital two hours later, he was gasping for breath, suffering from a potentially lethal heart arrhythmia. Doctors on duty were at a loss as to how they should treat him when the most likely culprit -- a drug he was taking called digitalis -- did not turn up in the bag of medicines that my mother had brought. "He is taking digitalis!" I said, but without the bottle present, and with doctor offices closed for the evening, I was helpless to verify that fact.

Luckily my story had a happy ending and my father was treated as if on digitalis. However, not all of us have the memory for the medications that we -- let alone our parents -- take in an emergency.

We keep financial, car and pet records, but how many of us keep our medical records? Most of us rely on strangers to keep our health information up to date and accessible -- when the only person you can rely on for this information is you.

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Comments

[wolfgangmo]

Oh crap, a "first" troll. I was hoping that this site would avoid that particular plague. Please go find a bridge to tag.

Medical records are every patients responsibility.

Know what is keeping you alive.

[Swerinjer]

First!