Open Wide, But Don’t Say…Anything Negative
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Your doctor examines you, and in the process, proves himself an incompetent creep with not a hint of a bedside manner. You’d like to share your experience online, so that other potential patients don’t make the same mistake. Can you do it? Maybe not, if “Medical Justice” has gotten to your doctor first. According to ZDBet Healthcare, this organization provides physicians with forms that the physicians can persuaude patients to sign before receiving treatment, which forms prevent the patients from later criticizing the doctor online.
Jeffrey Segal, who runs the Medical Justice site, claims he is not out to suppress patients’ right to review their doctors. He is concerned by the lack of regulation of sites that allow for such complaints, such as www.angieslist.com, www.MyDocHub.com, and www.RateMDs.com, where over-the-top, inflammatory comments are not unheard of.
Segal points to www.DrScore.com as a more scientific site that he may be able to support.
That Mr. Segal is seeking a better, more methodical approach to online reviews of doctors is laudable. His method, which seem analagous to burning books, is not.
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MDS Medical said:
This is an interesting topic, considering that online ‘reviews’ are the norm today in any business. Why should medical reviews be different? We consult with physicians in ‘online reputation management’ for this very reason – and monitor reviews, blogs, etc. that have been posted for and about them. The quandry is that one review posted by a disgruntled patient (or ex-spouse? uptight neighbor perhaps?) can top the google results when searching ‘dr. smith, boontownsville, wisconsin’. Ouch. Fortunately, these one-off slam reviews can usually be buried with a little reputation management due diligence. On the other hand, if there are ongoing poor reviews, they probably will carry some weight (both with patients and search engines). So like any other business, serving customers in an ethical and customer-friendly way will take care of reputation management online for the most part.
March 17th, 2009 at 8:07 pm