How do you store your health records for easy retrieval? Paper not digital.

medium long post for one simple question

Tick infections are/were just a small part of my unusual health Conditions. In my fifth decade, I have many specialized Test results dating back to my 20s. With several immune problems, my health files will continue to accumulate.

Unfortunately, I have the paper Test results that I need to look at a lot on my kitchen table. (And in just me saying that you guessed that I am single lol). The semi organized pile system is not good.

I think I need a special filing cabinet with big notes sticking up above the special files. If I had a lot of room, I would double file all of them under condition and the other under year.

So how do you keep your paper health records all organized? If I stack them all in one place, it would be 1.5 feet thick.

Of course I have a lot of paper printed special interest health articles also.

Even if I could keep all of this digitally, I wouldn’t - sooner or later that gets erased lost or you just can’t find it anymore. Even in the most brain fried version of myself, I can at least find a piece of paper versus going crazy trying to find something in digital form.

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Blows me away how some people without major health problems still leave it to one family doctor to store all the information and keep track of it. All of us here would be near death if we did this.

Astro, the more of your posts I read, the more I'm convinced that we are somehow cosmically connected!

Though I never completed the full process of organization, several years ago, I separated all my medical records by year and put them in individual file folders with the year noted on the label/tab.

These are the folders I have: https://www.amazon.com/dp/b002hi9rkm

For years, I had the folders in a few boxes that were just big enough to accommodate their width, but the folders' hooks were inside the box and did not hang over the edge. I had enough folders in each box that the folders remain upright and compressed together from front to back. It wasn't ideal, but it worked well enough.

I should have used a banker's box: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000NO06ZW where the hooks go over the side of the box and (sort of) slide in a little channel. Even better, some banker's boxes have a plastic channel into which the folders hook and slide. If sliding on just cardboard, the hooks will eventually tear into the cardboard.

There are also plastic containers like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/b00czokowi

Eventually, I bought two metal 2-drawer filing cabinets from Office Depot. While not the exact product, they are similar to this: https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/7954627/realspace-soho-smart-18d-vertical-2

They do a pretty good job and the hanging file folders slide on metal rails. They also have a lock and key, though it's certainly not high security. The cabinets metal is quite thin, but that can be an advantage when moving it empty. That's also an advantage of having two 2-drawer cabinets, versus having a single 4-drawer cabinet.

I'd prefer some heavy-duty, well-built filing cabinets like the company HON makes, but they are insanely expensive. However, the build quality is great and they use ball bearing sliding mechanisms, unlike mine that are just metal sliding on metal.

Actually, this looks decent: https://www.target.com/p/hirsh-2-drawer-vertical-file-cabinet-22-34-black/-/a-52436947 It's more expensive, but uses ball bearing mechanisms for the drawer slides.

Around the same time I started trying to organize my files, I bought an inexpensive flatbed Canon scanner off eBay. I think I paid around $50 or so. I started scanning some of my paper copies into the digital domain, with the intention of having an alternate archive. Plus, like you suggested, I could file the digital copies in multiple ways. I could make copies of files and organize them by year or doctor or type of document (lab test, radiology report, etc.) or body part or health condition, etc. That's a lot easier to do with digital files.

For me, the idea is to digitize paper copies and print digital copies I download from my electronic medical record. Paper files have advantages, but are at risk of fire and perhaps a water pipe bursting. Plus, obviously, natural disasters like tornado, hurricane, flood, etc. Scanned documents use very little space, relative to the abundance of cheap digital storage that's available. Digital files are easy to protect, transport, and access. One could use a cloud storage service. Alternately, files can be stored on an encrypted flash drive and carried in a pocket or purse. My computer uses four hard drives in a RAID-5 configuration, so I'm less vulnerable than having a single hard drive. However, I also perform occasional backups to an encrypted external hard drive.

I hope maybe some of this brain dump might be helpful.