§ 25-12,120.Hospital records; examination and inspection; presumption of consent; hospital medical staff committee; hospitalization utilization committee.

Hospitals rely on internal committees of doctors and staff to review the care patients receive — checking whether treatment was necessary, whether it met an appropriate standard, and whether continued hospitalization or extended care is still warranted. That kind of review depends on committee members being able to look at a patient’s medical records. Section 25-12,120 removes any question about patient consent to that access.

Since October 23, 1967, it is conclusively presumed, in the interest of public health and better hospital and patient care, and in the interest of using hospital facilities effectively, that every person hospitalized in a Nebraska hospital or confined in a Nebraska extended care facility has consented to having their medical records examined and inspected by a hospital medical staff committee or a utilization review committee. That review covers the patient’s care, treatment, and the need for hospitalization or extended care, and the committee’s purpose is to study and evaluate the necessity and quality of the care given and whether continued hospitalization or extended care remains warranted. Because the presumption is conclusive, a patient cannot come forward with evidence to rebut it — the law treats consent as given, as a matter of law, for this specific purpose.

The section also supplies a definition that applies to itself and to section 25-12,121: a hospital medical staff committee or hospital utilization committee, for purposes of these two sections, means a committee required by federal law or regulation to administer some or all of a federal health care program. That definition ties the committees covered here to a specific federal-law trigger, rather than reaching every internal hospital committee by that name.