Attorney Sobczak obtained a tremendous win for Massachusetts customers, patients, and residents of health care facilities, such as hospitals and nursing homes, at the Appeals Court last week. In a published opinion – Montanez v. 178 Lowell Street Operating Company, LLC, 95 Mass. App. Ct. 699 (2019) – the Court established that when providers, such as a nursing home in this case, refuse to timely provide all requested medical records, that is unfair or deceptive and can be prosecuted under Chapter 93A (“the defendant’s repeated omission of documents from its disclosures to the plaintiff, its failure to produce complete records for approximately four months, and its offer to allow the plaintiff to inspect and copy its records only (and immediately) after litigation commenced constitute violations of Federal regulations in ways that qualify as unfair or deceptive. Our conclusion is guided by the self-evident importance of the availability of medical records to consumers.”).
Moreover, the Court further held that ” the legal fees incurred in the preparation of both the letter and the aspect of this case that does not depend on success under c. 93A would amount to actual damages incurred as a result of the defendant’s failure timely to provide the records at issue. Costs like these incurred as a result of the underlying violative conduct are recoverable as damages.
With this published decision the Court reinforced the Massachusetts customers’ rights to their records and provided for powerful remedy when those rights are violated.
The FULL TEXT of this published opinion can be found here: http://masscases.com/cases/app/95/95massappct699.html