A portable heath care records system employs a server on which the health care records of participating patients are stored. The patients are issued cards that are inserted into the patient's computer to access each patient's records via the Internet for review and editing. The patient record is protected by patient ID and password. Treating physicians have access to each patient's records for review and update. A firewall permits patients to review their own health records only, but permits the physician to review both the physician files and the patient files. An read-only emergency screen containing important medical data about the patient may be accessed without the patient's password. Records of many patients and of many clinics are maintained on a common server, so that the patient record can be accessed globally.