A leading Sydney psychiatrist is lobbying the NSW government to stop the systematic destruction of psychiatric records, arguing patient files help with clinical care.
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Medical records used to be kept indefinitely but a change to guidelines allows them to be destroyed 15 years after the last patient contact.
In the past three years, more than 5000 files from Rozelle/Callan Park, Cumberland, James Fletcher and Kenmore psychiatric hospitals ranging from the 1960s to the 1980s have been incinerated.
Records archived before 1960 will be kept and will become publicly available in 110 years but consultant psychiatrist at Westmead Hospital Greg de Moore warns the new policy is compromising patient care.
He said files from the 1960s covered the transitional period from asylum to community care and were still relevant.
''We see patients today that have been in psychiatric care before - 20 or 30 years ago and those details are critical, past files not only assist with diagnosis but they offer insights into what treatments worked before,'' he said.
Like the stolen generation, children conceived and born to women in insane asylums were forcibly removed and adopted out. Children born between 1960 to 1980 will not be able to look through their parents' records.
Questions to the Minister for Health, Jillian Skinner, were referred to NSW Health. In an email, a spokeswoman said the decision was made after a review by Area Health Services and Department of Health Branches.
''A particular focus on the amending of retention of mental health records from 'indefinite' was to bring it into consistency with periods that apply to other patient records -15 years for admitted patients,'' the email said.
But Dr de Moore dismissed the government's reasoning as a short-sighted financial disaster.
Old medical records helped with research and to quantify trends.
''Some years ago I did a study on people who came to hospital with firearm injuries and what I found was that they were saying it was due to an accident: 'Just cleaning the gun, it happened to go off.' But in fact when I looked at the notes very carefully I began to see a pattern. Many of the patients coming into casualty with firearm injuries were actually survivors of self-harm either suicide or just trying to harm themselves.''
The study had led to changes in care for people with firearm injuries and was possible because of access to old medical records.
