Dental record keeping and retention requirements in Ontario

How long you must keep dental records

In Ontario, dentists must keep clinical and financial patient records - including radiographs, consultant reports, and drug and lab prescriptions - for at least ten years after the date of the last entry in the patient's record. For a minor, the records must be kept for at least ten years after the day the patient turned 18. The same ten-year rule applies to office records such as appointment books, equipment maintenance records, the sterilization log, and the drug register. The RCDSO Dental Recordkeeping guidelines are the authoritative source.

• Adults: at least 10 years from the last entry in the record
• Minors: at least 10 years after the patient turns 18
• Same 10-year rule for radiographs and prescriptions
• Office records (appointment book, sterilization log, drug register) also kept 10 years

What a complete dental record includes

A record isn't just clinical notes. RCDSO expects a complete, legible, contemporaneous record: medical and dental history, examination and diagnosis, treatment plan and informed consent, treatment provided and by whom, radiographs and lab work, prescriptions, and financial records. The test inspectors and reviewers apply is simple - could another provider reconstruct what happened and why from your chart alone?

Privacy: your PHIPA obligations

Dental records are personal health information, governed by Ontario's Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA). That makes the clinic a health information custodian responsible for safeguarding records, limiting access to those who need it, responding to patient access requests, and reporting privacy breaches. The Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario oversees PHIPA and publishes practical guidance for health custodians.

• Treat every chart as protected personal health information
• Limit access to staff who need it for care or administration
• Honour patient requests to access or correct their records
• Have a breach-response process in place before you need it

Storage, access, and secure destruction

Records can be paper or electronic, but either way they must be secure, backed up, and retrievable. Electronic records need access controls, audit trails, and reliable backups. When the retention period ends, records must be destroyed in a way that protects confidentiality - shredding or incineration for paper, secure wiping for digital media. Tossing old charts in the recycling is a privacy breach, not a cleanup.

Where recordkeeping meets your inspection

Recordkeeping overlaps directly with IPAC and operations: your sterilization log, equipment maintenance records, and training files are all part of the same retention obligation, and inspectors expect to find them fast. If your documentation is scattered across binders, drawers, and desktops, that's the gap to close first - start with our Ontario dental compliance checklist. Prime DMS builds recordkeeping and retention into IPAC manuals and policy development and aligns it with your health, safety and AODA obligations, and you can find plain-English answers in our Ontario dental compliance FAQ.