"How do I get my records?"

The four sets worth having

1. Your treatment records

Request them from every provider — the treating physician, the clinic, the hospital, imaging centers, and physical therapy. Ask for the complete chart, including chart notes, imaging reports, and the actual reports rather than a summary.

And your pre-injury records matter as much as your post-injury records. An apportionment opinion assigning disability to a pre-existing condition, written by a physician who reviewed nothing from before the injury, has no factual basis for the percentage. Your own primary care records showing no prior complaint are affirmative evidence. How apportionment works.

2. Your personnel file

California employees have a right to inspect and receive a copy. Request it in writing — the request itself creates a dated record.

What matters in it: your job description and actual duties (which drive the occupational group in your rating), performance and attendance history (evidence you were doing the full job before), any prior restriction or accommodation, and any discipline that appears suspiciously close to your claim. Retaliation.

3. Exposure and monitoring records

Where chemicals, noise, or other hazards were involved, these are the highest-value records you can obtain and almost nobody asks:

• Safety Data Sheets for every product — your employer must maintain them and make them accessible
• Air monitoring and industrial hygiene sampling results
• Hearing conservation program audiograms — a baseline plus annual tests showing exactly when your hearing shifted
• Medical surveillance results — blood lead levels, pulmonary function, liver panels

Employers must retain employee exposure records for 30 years and medical records for the duration of employment plus 30 years. A worker who left in 2011 can still ask.

Chemical exposure claims. · Hearing loss.

4. The claim file documents

The DWC-1 with the employer's section completed. Every benefit notice. The utilization review decisions. The complete payment history — which is what proves a late payment and the automatic 10% under § 4650(d). How.

And the ones outside your own file

Cal/OSHA citation history for your employer — public, searchable, free. A prior citation for the same condition is close to the center of a § 4553 serious and willful petition, which increases compensation by one-half. Twelve-month deadline. How.

The Violent Incident Log, where an assault is involved. Since July 1, 2024, § 6401.9 requires nearly every California employer to maintain one and make it available to employees and their representatives.

Coverage verification through caworkcompcoverage.com or the WCIRB, where insurance is in question.

A word about releases

A medical release should be limited to the injured body parts and a relevant time period. A blanket authorization for your entire lifetime medical history hands the defense every prior complaint in your file. Narrowing it is normal and is usually accepted. More.