Clinical (Hospital Inpatient) Records
(For military personnel while on Active Duty)
Clinical (inpatient) records are compiled when members are actually hospitalized while in the service. An overnight stay or admission generally makes a patient an inpatient. The resulting records from hospital care are called either clinical or inpatient records. Clinical (inpatient) records are filed at NPRC (MPR) by the name of the hospital in which the member was treated. Therefore, NPRC (MPR) needs the name of the hospital, month (if known) and year of treatment, as well as the veteran's name and social security or service number to locate a clinical record.
Clinical records are retired to NPRC (MPR) in annual collections by the creating hospital. Army and Air Force records are retained one calendar year and Navy records are retained two calendar years before retirement. Teaching hospitals that maintain Clinical Record Libraries may retain records up to 5 years before retirement to NPRC (MPR). Clinical records in collections retired by hospitals to NPRC (MPR) include:
| Branch of Service | Earliest Clinical Record Collections at NPRC (MPR) |
|---|---|
| Army Hospitals | 1960 * (see note below) |
| Air Force Hospitals | 1957 * (see note below) |
| Navy Hospitals | 1940's |
| * Note: | Clinical records created prior to 1960 for Army personnel, and prior to 1957 for Air Force personnel were usually filed in the Official Military Personnel File. They were not retired to NPRC in separate shipments by hospitals. Therefore, many of the documents recording inpatient care for Army and Air Force veterans were destroyed in the 1973 fire. An exception to this would be those clinical records (dating back as early as 1957 for Army hospitals, 1951 for Air Force hospitals ) which were maintained at Clinical Record Libraries at selected treatment facilities. There are also small, scattered collections of records from years earlier than those listed above, and some alternate medical records sources for the fire-related period as defined below. |
| Medical Related Alternate Records |
NPRC has identified some Medical-related alternate records sources for partial reconstruction of the information lost in the 1973 fire. Documents that provide information about diagnosis and prognosis, however, are limited and sources are not comprehensive. Nevertheless, NPRC (MPR) does utilize a source of 7.8 million hospital admission abstracts from |
See Access by the Public for instructions on preparing written requests for information from Clinical (Hospital Inpatient) Records created for military personnel while on active duty.
Note: By comparison, outpatient records (referred to as active duty health records) which include induction and separation physicals, routine medical care when the person was not admitted to a hospital, dental, and mental health records were retired to NPRC (MPR) in the Official Military Personnel File until the early 1990s. Now they are sent to the Department of Veterans Affairs (except for the U.S. Coast Guard).
"NARA ensures, for the Citizen and the Public Servant, for the President and the Congress and the Courts, ready access to essential evidence."
