Suing your patients

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Hundy

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Has anyone ever heard of a physician suing their patient?

Well I am being harassed by a physician about whom I posted a negative yelp review. This person/their office is emailing me to remove the post or else be sued. They sent me threatening email months ago and they started sending me these emails again recently.

I am also pretty sure that this physician/office created a fake yelp provide to try to obtain information from me.

I am also being "forwarded" and included in supposed communication between the office and the "legal team," which I am under the impression is this physician impersonating a lawyer given that there is no actual name/law firm listed. I think this is absolute crazy town. This person also has threatened other patients with lawsuits over negative posts. I actually talked to a lawyer who told me that 1-this sounds absolutely crazy, and 2-that the likelihood of winning a lawsuit like that is slim to none even if it went through.

Has anyone ever heard of this happening? I had to report this person to the state's medical board given the insanity and persistence of their actions.

Any thoughts on this?

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Has anyone ever heard of a physician suing their patient?

Well I am being harassed by a physician about whom I posted a negative yelp review. This person/their office is emailing me to remove the post or else be sued. They sent me threatening email months ago and they started sending me these emails again recently.

I am also pretty sure that this physician/office created a fake yelp provide to try to obtain information from me.

I am also being "forwarded" and included in supposed communication between the office and the "legal team," which I am under the impression is this physician impersonating a lawyer given that there is no actual name/law firm listed. I think this is absolute crazy town. This person also has threatened other patients with lawsuits over negative posts. I actually talked to a lawyer who told me that 1-this sounds absolutely crazy, and 2-that the likelihood of winning a lawsuit like that is slim to none even if it went through.

Has anyone ever heard of this happening? I had to report this person to the state's medical board given the insanity and persistence of their actions.

Any thoughts on this?

Post the link to the yelp review.
 
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So readers can formulate an opinion as to whether it merely expressed your protected right to offer a review of the provider's services, or if it contains language that is slanderous, defamatory or potentially untrue. If the former is the case, then perhaps the physician is trying to bully you, if the latter is the case, then the physician may have a valid action. Of course, nobody on this forum can give legal advice.

As a compromise, how about copying and pasting the review itself (verbatim)?
 
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So readers can formulate an opinion as to whether it merely expressed your protected right to offer a review of the provider's services, or if it contains language that is slanderous, defamatory or potentially untrue. If the former is the case, then perhaps the physician is trying to bully you, if the latter is the case, then the physician may have a valid action. Of course, nobody on this forum can give legal advice.

As a compromise, how about copying and pasting the review itself (verbatim)?

I have no interest in identifying myself for one. As mentioned I talked to a lawyer already, and he thought it was insane and even told me I'd be wasting my $ if I hired a lawyer.

So not hoping to get legal advice from here, I'm just getting other people's thoughts on this regarding how insane it is that a doctor would sue a patient, also a patient who happens to be a physician.
 
Yes I have heard of physicians suing patients... for defamation/slander. In extreme situations usually. No one here can tell you if this is "insane" or not from the perspective of other physicians without reading the review in question. Would also be interested to know if you identified yourself as a physician in the review. Depending on the content, if it did amount to the legal definition of defamation or slander, identifying yourself as a physician could increase the severity of injury.
 
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I have no interest in identifying myself for one. As mentioned I talked to a lawyer already, and he thought it was insane and even told me I'd be wasting my $ if I hired a lawyer.

So not hoping to get legal advice from here, I'm just getting other people's thoughts on this regarding how insane it is that a doctor would sue a patient, also a patient who happens to be a physician.

And I totally get where you're coming from, I was just trying to point out that without knowing what the review says, it's impossible for someone to guess that physician's motivation.
 
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Yes I have heard of physicians suing patients... for defamation/slander. In extreme situations usually. No one here can tell you if this is "insane" or not from the perspective of other physicians without reading the review in question. Would also be interested to know if you identified yourself as a physician in the review. Depending on the content, if it did amount to the legal definition of defamation or slander, identifying yourself as a physician could increase the severity of injury.
And more importantly: why a physician would post a bad Yelp review about another physician? What are we, teenagers?
 
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If it's defamation and/or slander, any healthcare provider has that right to sue as it could constitute a potential loss of income via heeding off future patients/referrals due to information that is potentially untrue/inaccurate. Nothing really controversial here on the face of things. You have a right to your opinion, the provider has a right to contest (legally, if need be) that opinion if it contains false/slanderous/defamatory information.
 
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Yes I have heard of physicians suing patients... for defamation/slander. In extreme situations usually. No one here can tell you if this is "insane" or not from the perspective of other physicians without reading the review in question. Would also be interested to know if you identified yourself as a physician in the review. Depending on the content, if it did amount to the legal definition of defamation or slander, identifying yourself as a physician could increase the severity of injury.

No I did not identify myself as a physician. I simply felt the provider provided poor care, and handled financial aspects in an inappropriate manner despite numerous good faith attempts on my end to resolve things. They seem dishonest, and this person has numerous reviews describing similar things to my experience. Another physician that I saw who I ended up staying with for care actually even told me that this person had been fired from a previous position, and I posted that that was also part of the reason I felt uneasy about continuing care in addition to my poor experience. This person like I said has continued to email me with threats, has created fake profiles, I think has pretended to be "legal", etc.
 
If it's defamation and/or slander, any healthcare provider has that right to sue as it could constitute a potential loss of income via heeding off future patients/referrals due to information that is potentially untrue/inaccurate. Nothing really controversial here on the face of things. You have a right to your opinion, the provider has a right to contest (legally, if need be) that opinion if it contains false/slanderous/defamatory information.

Suing your patient for their thoughts has nut case written all over it, especially continuing to email them about it and pretending to be someone else. Further it's nearly impossible to prove damages in a situation like this. I also will sue them if they continue harassing me. Bad idea all around. Most physicians get bad reviews at times, knowing how to deal with them and dealing with patients appropriately is generally a good idea.
 
And more importantly: why a physician would post a bad Yelp review about another physician? What are we, teenagers?

Because that was my experience, and the physician is not a good one in my opinion. And like I said despite numerous attempts on my end to calmly solve a situation they kept being dishonest.
 
Suing your patient for their thoughts has nut case written all over it, especially continuing to email them about it and pretending to be someone else. Further it's nearly impossible to prove damages in a situation like this. I also will sue them if they continue harassing me. Bad idea all around. Most physicians get bad reviews at times, knowing how to deal with them and dealing with patients appropriately is generally a good idea.

If the "thoughts" contain inaccurate/slanderous/etc information that could harm someone's practice, it's simply good business sense to take legal action. As I said, impossible to know what the real story is because we have no verifiable information regarding the situation.
 
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If the "thoughts" contain inaccurate/slanderous/etc information that could harm someone's practice, it's simply good business sense to take legal action. As I said, impossible to know what the real story is because we have no verifiable information regarding the situation.

If a person feels they have a legal claim then they take legal action. They don't repeatedly email patients threatening them and pretending to be someone else. And they certainly don't do it repeatedly with multiple patients.
 
If a person feels they have a legal claim then they take legal action. They don't repeatedly email patients threatening them and pretending to be someone else. And they certainly don't do it repeatedly with multiple patients.

Then feel free to document everything and take your own legal action.
 
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Because that was my experience, and the physician is not a good one in my opinion. And like I said despite numerous attempts on my end to calmly solve a situation they kept being dishonest.
Then either approach them as a fellow physician (what I would do) or report them to the medical board.
 
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Then either approach them as a fellow physician (what I would do) or report them to the medical board.

I gave this physician and the office countless times to do the right thing and they did not. this person is not treating me as a colleague and has insisted on making things ugly. I even said look you are threatening me in writing. I called it a day at that point and now months later the threats start again. I did report them to the board. I don't think I had an option. The behavior to me shows some serious pathology.
 
Has anyone ever heard of a physician suing their patient?

Well I am being harassed by a physician about whom I posted a negative yelp review. This person/their office is emailing me to remove the post or else be sued. They sent me threatening email months ago and they started sending me these emails again recently.

I am also pretty sure that this physician/office created a fake yelp provide to try to obtain information from me.

I am also being "forwarded" and included in supposed communication between the office and the "legal team," which I am under the impression is this physician impersonating a lawyer given that there is no actual name/law firm listed. I think this is absolute crazy town. This person also has threatened other patients with lawsuits over negative posts. I actually talked to a lawyer who told me that 1-this sounds absolutely crazy, and 2-that the likelihood of winning a lawsuit like that is slim to none even if it went through.

Has anyone ever heard of this happening? I had to report this person to the state's medical board given the insanity and persistence of their actions.

Any thoughts on this?


Haven't specifically heard of this happening but it does not sound surprising.

If they felt you made false claims, they can potentially go after you legally. Online reviews are getting more and more popular and when a physician get's searched for on Google, the last thing they want is the first search to show negative reviews. Whether your review is legitimate or not, who knows.

Regarding your lawyer's statement, sometimes it isn't just about winning, but about dragging the other person through the legal process and costing them time/money/stress in the process.
 
Haven't specifically heard of this happening but it does not sound surprising.

If they felt you made false claims, they can potentially go after you legally. Online reviews are getting more and more popular and when a physician get's searched for on Google, the last thing they want is the first search to show negative reviews. Whether your review is legitimate or not, who knows.

Regarding your lawyer's statement, sometimes it isn't just about winning, but about dragging the other person through the legal process and costing them time/money/stress in the process.
Haven't specifically heard of this happening but it does not sound surprising.

If they felt you made false claims, they can potentially go after you legally. Online reviews are getting more and more popular and when a physician get's searched for on Google, the last thing they want is the first search to show negative reviews. Whether your review is legitimate or not, who knows.

Regarding your lawyer's statement, sometimes it isn't just about winning, but about dragging the other person through the legal process and costing them time/money/stress in the process.


Unfortunately not winning equals losing and paying the other persons legal fees and opens possibilities of being sued back. As my mentor in college told me when I asked if I could take Mcat officially for practice, no one takes such chances. People don't sue just to annoy someone, if they don't want to be liable and open themselves for a mess.
 
I've always wondered who has the time to write these reviews. If I don't like something I'm like "this sucks" and move on.
 
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Another physician that I saw who I ended up staying with for care actually even told me that this person had been fired from a previous position, and I posted that that was also part of the reason I felt uneasy about continuing care in addition to my poor experience.

While the above sentence is long and confusing, if you actually included something in your yelp review about how you heard the physician was fired from another practice, that's poor form, and I can see the anger on the part of the physician.
 
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I am worried about this poster - this is the fourth account I believe they have created addressing similar issues, and subsequently being banned. The tone and diction used has always been the same, so pretty easy to pick-up. Judging from their multiple posts, a PM&R resident with a lot of persecutory thoughts from those around her at her program/world at large (and apparently her treating physicians). She never seems to get an answer to her liking and the threads end with her being banned/blocked.
Not really a troll, but I would really urge them to find someone local (and in-person) with whom to talk about her concerns. Posting here repeatedly is not a healthy outlet.

Previous banned accounts:
Lostin_space
Dog_luver
Leukodystrophy

See To apply or not apply as an example
And Strange things happen to me for this exact same discussion
 
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While the above sentence is long and confusing, if you actually included something in your yelp review about how you heard the physician was fired from another practice, that's poor form, and I can see the anger on the part of the physician.

It's a lot more than poor form. It is a statement of fact rather than opinion. If there's a suit, this is where it will start.
 
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I am worried about this poster - this is the fourth account I believe they have created addressing similar issues, and subsequently being banned. The tone and diction used has always been the same, so pretty easy to pick-up. Judging from their multiple posts, a PM&R resident with a lot of persecutory thoughts from those around her at her program/world at large (and apparently her treating physicians). She never seems to get an answer to her liking and the threads end with her being banned/blocked.
Not really a troll, but I would really urge them to find someone local (and in-person) with whom to talk about her concerns. Posting here repeatedly is not a healthy outlet.

Previous banned accounts:
Lostin_space
Dog_luver
Leukodystrophy

See To apply or not apply as an example
And Strange things happen to me for this exact same discussion

you are right :p
 
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I am worried about this poster - this is the fourth account I believe they have created addressing similar issues, and subsequently being banned. The tone and diction used has always been the same, so pretty easy to pick-up. Judging from their multiple posts, a PM&R resident with a lot of persecutory thoughts from those around her at her program/world at large (and apparently her treating physicians). She never seems to get an answer to her liking and the threads end with her being banned/blocked.
Not really a troll, but I would really urge them to find someone local (and in-person) with whom to talk about her concerns. Posting here repeatedly is not a healthy outlet.

Previous banned accounts:
Lostin_space
Dog_luver
Leukodystrophy

See To apply or not apply as an example
And Strange things happen to me for this exact same discussion
Wow, yeah. The similarities aren't even subtle.
 
I am worried about this poster - this is the fourth account I believe they have created addressing similar issues, and subsequently being banned. The tone and diction used has always been the same, so pretty easy to pick-up. Judging from their multiple posts, a PM&R resident with a lot of persecutory thoughts from those around her at her program/world at large (and apparently her treating physicians). She never seems to get an answer to her liking and the threads end with her being banned/blocked.
Not really a troll, but I would really urge them to find someone local (and in-person) with whom to talk about her concerns. Posting here repeatedly is not a healthy outlet.

Previous banned accounts:
Lostin_space
Dog_luver
Leukodystrophy

See To apply or not apply as an example
And Strange things happen to me for this exact same discussion
thank you.

We had our own suspicions but had not finalized our research. We appreciate your input.
 
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And more importantly: why a physician would post a bad Yelp review about another physician? What are we, teenagers?

This x1,000,000.

Physicians can't respond to negative reviews like business owners can because of HIPAA. I can't even imagine making a negative review about another physician. Total BS.


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
 
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