How to Fill Out and Submit the Oregon Medical Board Complaint Form

To file a complaint against a doctor or other practitioner licensed in Oregon, download the Oregon Medical Board complaint form from the board’s website, fill it out with the provider’s information and a dated, factual account of what happened, and submit it by mail to the board’s Portland office or through the board’s online portal. Oregon law requires every complaint to be in writing, so phone calls will not start a case. A little preparation before you open the form — confirming the board actually regulates your provider, pulling together dates and facility names, and drafting a focused narrative — is what separates a complaint that moves forward from one that stalls at intake.

Confirm the Board Regulates Your Provider

The Oregon Medical Board only oversees certain license types under ORS Chapter 677:

Medical Doctors (MD)
Doctors of Osteopathic Medicine (DO)
Physician Associates (PA), a title Oregon adopted in 2024 in place of “Physician Assistant”¹
Doctors of Podiatric Medicine (DPM)
Licensed Acupuncturists (LAc)

Complaints about nurses go to the Oregon State Board of Nursing.² Complaints about dentists go to the Oregon Board of Dentistry.³ The medical board has no authority over providers it does not license, so filing in the wrong place just delays things.

What the Board Will and Won’t Investigate

The board’s Investigations Department reviews complaints for possible violations of Oregon’s Medical Practice Act.⁴ That includes gross negligence, repeated negligent acts, and sexual misconduct with a patient.⁵ Oregon statute adds several other grounds for discipline: fraud in obtaining a fee, impairment, divulging patient information without consent, criminal conviction, and misrepresenting that an incurable condition can be cured.⁶

The board generally will not investigate billing disputes, rude office staff, or a provider’s attitude, because those situations usually don’t rise to a violation of state law.⁵ A strictly financial dispute is better handled with the provider’s office directly or with the Oregon Division of Financial Regulation.

What to Gather Before You Start

Missing details are the most common reason complaints stall at intake. Pull the following together first:

The provider’s full name (first, middle, last) and license type. A license number, if you have one, removes ambiguity when providers share a name; you can look it up on the board’s online license verification tool.⁷
The specific dates the provider cared for you or the patient.
The name, address, and treatment date of any hospital or urgent care facility connected to the complaint.
The names and addresses of any other providers who treated the patient after the incident.
Your own full name, mailing address, phone number, and email so the board can reach you.

The form also asks whether you’ve already contacted the provider about the issue and whether you’ve filed a complaint anywhere else. Answer honestly; neither disqualifies your complaint.

Filling Out the Form Section by Section

The complaint form (last revised May 2025) is a two-page PDF with five sections.⁷ A Spanish-language version is available, and you can request a paper copy from the board’s office.⁸

Complainant and Patient Information

The first section asks for your name, address, phone, email, and date of birth. If you’re filing on behalf of someone else, a second section captures the patient’s information and your relationship to them.

Complaint Against

Check the box for the license type (MD, DO, PA, DPM, or LAc) and enter the provider’s name, office address, and phone number. The license number field is optional but useful.

Specific Information and Narrative

This is the section that matters most. The form asks five targeted questions: the dates of care, whether you contacted the provider, whether other providers treated the patient afterward, whether any hospital or urgent care visits are related, and whether you’ve filed elsewhere. Answer each one.

Then write the narrative. Stick to facts, dates, and what you observed, and put events in chronological order. “On March 3 the doctor prescribed X, and on March 10 I developed Y” gives an investigator something to work with in a way that general statements about feeling dismissed do not. Attach extra pages if you need more room; the form explicitly allows it.⁷

Certification and Signature

At the bottom you sign a statement certifying the information is true to the best of your knowledge. An unsigned paper form gets returned, so don’t skip the signature line.

How to Submit the Complaint

You have two ways to get it to the board:

By mail, to Oregon Medical Board, Investigations Manager, 1500 SW 1st Ave., Suite 620, Portland, OR 97201. Send the signed form along with any supporting documents.⁸
Online, through the complaint submission portal linked from the board’s “How to File a Complaint” page. The online form walks you through the same fields as the PDF.⁹

You don’t have to use the official form. The board also accepts a letter, as long as it covers everything the form asks for: provider name and license type, dates, facility details, a factual narrative, and your contact information.⁸ The form is easier because it prompts you for each item.

What Happens After You File

The board reviews every complaint it receives.¹⁰

Staff first enter the complaint into a database, and an intake committee decides whether the allegations, if true, would constitute a violation of the Medical Practice Act. If not, or if the matter falls outside the board’s jurisdiction, the case closes at this stage with no formal action.

If the review identifies a potential violation, the case is assigned to a board investigator, who may contact you for follow-up questions or additional documentation. Complaints can take many months to resolve, and complex cases sometimes stretch past a year.⁹ The completed investigation goes to an Investigative Committee, which makes a recommendation to the full board; the full board makes the final decision.¹⁰

The board will tell you whether an investigation will be opened, and, if so, will notify you of the general outcome when the case is resolved. You can contact the board at any time to check status.⁹

One thing catches many complainants off guard. Oregon law (ORS 676.175) requires the board to keep the specifics of an investigation confidential, so the board cannot share details of what it found with you, even though you filed the complaint. If the board issues a formal order finding a violation, that order becomes public record, and you can request a copy for a $10 fee.⁹

The Board Cannot Award You Money

A board complaint is a regulatory process for protecting the public by investigating misconduct and, when warranted, disciplining the provider. It does not compensate you for medical bills, lost wages, pain, or any other damages you suffered.

If you want financial recovery for injuries caused by a provider’s negligence, that requires a medical malpractice lawsuit in civil court, which is a separate legal process with its own requirements. Oregon has its own statute of limitations for malpractice claims, so consult an attorney promptly if you’re considering that route.

You can pursue both paths at once. Filing a board complaint does not prevent you from suing, and a lawsuit does not stop the board from investigating. That’s why the form asks whether you’ve filed elsewhere.

1
Oregon Medical Board. Physician Associate Collaborative Practice
2
Oregon State Board of Nursing. File a Complaint About a Licensee or Self-Report
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Oregon Board of Dentistry. File Complaint/Complaint Process
4
Oregon Medical Board. Investigations
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Oregon Medical Board. Information for Person Making a Complaint
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Oregon State Legislature. Oregon Code 677 – Regulation of Medicine, Podiatry and Acupuncture
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Oregon Medical Board. Oregon Medical Board Complaint Form
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Oregon Medical Board. Oregon Medical Board – Contact Us
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Oregon Medical Board. How to File a Complaint
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Oregon Medical Board. Anatomy of a Complaint