According to AHIMA’s recommended retention standards, which type of health information does NOT need to be retained permanently?

• A. Physician index
• B. Clinical notes
• C. Discharge summaries
• D. Vital statistics

Answer: (A)

In health information management, items that truly document a patient’s medical care and history are kept permanently because they provide the enduring legal and clinical record of what happened. Clinical notes, discharge summaries, and vital statistics all serve as that definitive record of care, outcomes, and events, so they are retained indefinitely.

A physician index, by contrast, is primarily an administrative tool used to locate and associate records with the physicians who treated the patient. It does not itself record clinical information or patient outcomes, and AHIMA allows it to be retained only for a limited period rather than permanently. Once the record can be retrieved by other means, the index isn’t required to be kept.