JeHDI Medical Records Export for DVA — How to Read Your UMR

Defence health records are often the backbone of a successful DVA claim — and the hardest part of the file to navigate. This guide covers how to request those records, what a JeHDI medical records export looks like versus a scanned Unit Medical Record (UMR), and how to turn that dump into evidence you can actually map to RMA Statements of Principles.

What JeHDI and UMR mean in a DVA claim

JeHDI is Defence’s electronic health environment. It was introduced in 2014. If most of a veteran’s service sits after that transition, the release may include a more structured electronic export (often HTML or similarly structured files) with discrete consultations, referrals, and reports.

UMR (unit medical record / Defence medical file) is the broader label veterans use for the health pack they receive. For many who discharged before JeHDI was in place — or whose earlier history was never fully digitised — that pack is often a giant PDF of scanned paper pages: readable to a human, painful to search, and easy to miss key dates in.

Both formats can support a claim. The practical difference is how much structure you get “out of the box,” and how much work it takes to extract claim-relevant facts.

How to request your Defence health records (current method)

Athena does not request records from Defence for you. Use Defence’s official personal information request process:

defence.gov.au — Personal information requests

• Fastest path for most people: submit a personal information request in ServiceConnect via My Service Records (identity verification with myID, electronic delivery, progress tracking).
• If you cannot use ServiceConnect: use the Defence website form. Identity is confirmed with certified documents; material is typically returned on an encrypted, password-protected USB by post.
• Health records, psychology records, incident/inquiry records, and service records can all be relevant to a DVA claim — request what you need for the conditions you intend to lodge.

Portals and instructions can change. Always follow the current Defence guidance on that page. Advocates should use authorised pathways appropriate to their role and the veteran’s consent.

Practical workflow: from Defence release to claim-ready evidence

Think of this as obtain → extract → structure → build — the same loop Athena is designed around.

1. Request and receive your health (and related) records via the Defence personal information request process above.
2. Archive the original untouched in a /source/ folder (USB copy, zip, or export as delivered).
3. Import a working copy into Athena’s Evidence Vault on your Mac or iPad — processing stays securely on your device.
4. Let Athena unpack big exports — a JeHDI HTML export or a hundreds-of-pages scanned UMR can be split into individual records (consultations, referrals, pathology, discharge summaries), each with its own date, type, and searchable text.
5. Tag and search — on-device AI identifies conditions, medications, dates, and diagnostic findings so you are not hunting page-by-page through one blob.
6. Check completeness — if you import a Complete Record, Athena can flag consultations listed there that are still missing from your vault.
7. Map to claims — link excerpts to conditions and RMA SOP factors (or check presumptive liability where it may apply), then prepare your myService pack.

Still organising years of civilian PDFs alongside Defence files? See how to organise medical evidence.

How to read your UMR (human scan order + Athena)

Whether you are skimming a scanned PDF yourself or reviewing what Athena unpacked, prioritise high-signal material:

• Discharge / separation summaries — diagnoses, restrictions, and end-of-service snapshots
• Specialist letters — named conditions and clinical opinions
• Injury / incident entries — dates that may meet SOP timeframes
• Mental health and psychology notes — stressor descriptions and onset language
• Imaging and pathology — objective support for musculoskeletal and other claims
• Routine admin noise — vaccinations and logistics that rarely help a factor test

When you find a useful excerpt, capture: date → clinical finding → location/context → which SOP factor (or presumptive route) it might support.

In Athena, that capture is not a sticky note on a printout. Unpacked records stay searchable in the vault; as you build a claim, background evidence suggestions can surface supporting pages you may have forgotten existed. That is the practical meaning of “how to read your UMR” in a modern workflow: extract the structure first, then read with purpose.

From UMR excerpts to RMA SOP factors

DVA decision makers test your story against Statements of Principles — unless a claim sits on the presumptive liability pathway. After you extract UMR facts, map them to factors using the SOP Library Preview or Athena’s offline SOP Navigator (full library on-device; updated more regularly than this website). For the legislative framework, read the Ultimate Guide to RMA SOPs.

Privacy tip for advocates

JeHDI and UMR releases contain highly sensitive health information. Prefer tools that keep casework securely on the device. Athena’s advocate workflow is built so client records never need to leave the Mac or iPad — details on the DVA advocate software page.