Frequently Asked Questions
Does Dr. Bernhoft provide hospitalized care?
Dr. Bernhoft and the rest of the medical staff at the Bernhoft Center for Advanced Medicine will NOT be providing hospitalized care or emergency care for patients from the clinic.
The therapies that patients will receive will compliment the care they receive from their primary care physicians and will not replace those treatments.
What does the FACS after Dr. Bernhoft’s name stand for? Dr. Bernhoft is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (for more info about FACS, click here)
My doctor is not longer in practice, how do I get my medical records?
There is no central “repository” for medical records. If a physician moves, retires, or passes away, sometimes another physician will either “buy out” or take over his/her practice. The “active” patients are usually notified by mail (as a courtesy), and told where to obtain their records. If you cannot locate the physician, you may want to contact your local county medical society (which is part of the California Medical Association) to see if they have any information about the physician’s practice (e.g., did someone else take over the practice?). For assistance you may go to their Web site: http://www.cmanet.org/.
Additionally, you can contact the Medical Board’s licensing division at 916-263-2382 (press option 1), or on the Board’s Web site’s profiles at Check Your Doctor, to obtain the physician’s address of record for his or her license. Write to the doctor at that address, even if the doctor has died, and request that a copy of your records be sent to you. If the address has a forwarding order on it, your letter will be forwarded to the doctor’s new address. The doctor has 15 days from the time your letter is received to send you a copy of your records, if the records are still available.
If the doctor died and did not transfer the practice to someone else, you might have to check your local Probate Court to see whether the doctor has an executor for his or her estate. You could then contact the executor to see if you can get a copy of the records. Depending on how much time has passed, whoever is appointed as the custodian of records can have the records destroyed.
Do you have a question that should be on the FAQ? Send us an email and let us know what it is!