Once the treatment for your patient has ended, it may seem that the purpose of collection has ended, and you can dispose of the medical records. However, as these records may be needed again, you should always hold on to them. While the Privacy Act does not set a minimum period for storing medical records, you will likely need to keep medical records for:

• a minimum of seven years from the last entry of an adult; and 
• until any patients who are children are 25 years of age.

As above, these are minimums. If legal proceedings are likely, you may need to keep the record for a more extended period of time.

You can change a client's status to Archived. Client Records are not deleted or removed.

Only users with Administrator role can archive clients.

To archive Clients that you have not had contact with in the past seven years, go to Statistics and Extracts and select Archive Clients. This menu option will not be visible to you unless you have done the following:

• Logon with the username Master. The default password is Master unless you have changed this (recommend you do)
• Go to Utilities - User Roles
• Select the users who can Archive Clients
• Check Can Archive Clients

• Save and Close

This user can now select Statistics and Extracts - Archive Clients

• Information on 'How long to store Patient Medical Records' is displayed.
• Select Accept