Florida Hospital Waterman, Inc. v. Buster, No. SC06-912 (Fla. Mar. 6, 2008)

The Supreme Court of Florida upheld an amendment to the Florida Constitution, entitled the Patients' Right to Know About Adverse Medical Incidents, which provides patients with the right to access any records made or received in the course of business by a health care facility or provider relating to any adverse medical incident. The court held that the right of access is retroactive and therefore applies to adverse medical incident records existing prior to its effective date of November 2, 2004. Thus, despite the medical providers' expectation, relying on other Florida statutes restricting access to this information, previously made incident reports and peer review records will not be protected.