S.B. No. 270
                                        AN ACT
    1-1  relating to the form in which a person may provide a copy, summary,
    1-2  or narrative of a patient's medical records.
    1-3        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-4        SECTION 1.  Section 5.08, Medical Practice Act (Article
    1-5  4495b, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes), is amended by adding
    1-6  Subsection (n) to read as follows:
    1-7        (n)  A person who may provide a copy of a record, or a
    1-8  summary or narrative of the record, to another under this section
    1-9  may provide the copy, summary, or narrative:
   1-10              (1)  on paper; or
   1-11              (2)  on microfilm, microfiche, computer hard disk,
   1-12  magnetic tape, or optical disk or by means of another appropriate
   1-13  medium, including a machine-readable medium, if the person who is
   1-14  to provide and the person who is to receive the copy, summary, or
   1-15  narrative agree to a form authorized by this subdivision.
   1-16        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-17  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-18  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-19  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-20  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   1-21  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   1-22  passage, and it is so enacted.