What about your competitors? What about folks who are just bat-sh*t insane or liars? Yelp is one of the worst places for reviews on anything. The fact that they do next to nothing to get rid of fake/multiple accounts is well known. I read a string of negative reviews on a small sandwich shop that were just a string of copy-and-paste complaints that are word for word the same as for a dozen other places those posters have been to in as many cities and then 'other' posters coming in and agreeing to the same thing. In that case it was too much mayo on a sandwich that isn't even made w/ mayo. Of course, you'd have to go to the business to know that, but if you'd listened to the Yelp reviews you'd never learn they were fraudulent.

Taking the word of an online review of any business makes as much sense as believing everything that hits your inbox.

@ Bizzer: I'm glad you live no where near me. I use yelp fairly often, and they have been pretty accurate for the places I've been. In the end, it is better to have knowledge than otherwise. I hope your city keeps all the fraudulent reviews there, and they don't spread.

@Eltex: When I clicked on the suspect users' profiles I'd see his/her other posts and they're for bars/restaurants/shops all across the country and the user locations are varied as well. It's amazing how users from Seattle, New York, Houston, Topeka, LA, etc... all structure their complaints EXACTLY the same way w/ the same syntax and grammar. Double-check some of the negative reviews. I only like Yelp just to see if they have the hours and price range and it's fairly up-to-date on whether a place is still in business. Otherwise, they're not too bad for helping me locate a business. I just don't trust what other people post as reviews. Less in the area of fraud - A string of apples & oranges comparisons between two bakeries was a source of great amusement to me. People would post on their favorite how great is was and much the other one sucked and then go to the one they disliked and trash it in reviews about how it isn't as good as their favorite. Even though they don't even carry the same products w/ one being specialty breads and the other being old-world 'classic' artisan breads. However, those were frighteningly lopsided w/ more bashers coming out of the fan-base for the old-world style place.

To go back to the main topic and add something I stupidly left off - I've had people call my business to complain about a bad phone experience and rant on and on about how rude someone in my office was, only for me or a coworker to first verify the employee name and the time of the call. Then point out that the 'bad employee' was out sick that day, or that person left months/years before the call allegedly took place. I had one where I was able to turn and see the 'bad' coworker's empty desk 10 feet away, a 'bad' coworker I was good friends w/ and KNEW that person had taken a vacation that day. However, there was a blinking light on the phone for a new voice-mail. Guess where the caller got my colleague's name? In that case, the person still insisted he had spoken w/ her and that I was lying. However, it was clear he was flustered and he quickly hung up. I can't imagine the stuff that guy would have posted online.

Moral of the story: Trying to force people away from negative criticism is a bad PR move.

If this dentist had simply left the issue alone instead of trying to extort money from an unhappy patient, nobody would have ever heard of this story to begin with.

I don't think that anyone questions the fact that fraudulant compaints sometimes get posted, so I don't know what is accomplished by posting anecdotes about it.

To those that are against complaint websites, my question is this: What is a patient or customer (in the case of a business) supposed to do if he or she is treated unfairly or rudely by a medical professional?

A few decades ago a doctor or business owner had to think seriously about his reputation because the customer base was smaller and there was often more competition. In today's world of mergers and monopolistic megacorporations it's been my experience that businesses often don't even CARE if you get upset. Why should they? Their customer base is huge and there is often little or no competition.

Where I live there is really one grocery store of any significance. In their restrooms, they have those faucets that don't allow the user to change the temperature. For the last two years (!!!!) they have kept it so hot that my young child literally cries from the pain when he must wash his hands. I've complained about it 3 or 4 times and they do nothing about it. They don't care if I hate them or not because they know perfectly well that I have no choice. My family must have food so I must continue to shop there.

It's been my experience that many of today's business and medical doctors start to care ONLY if their bad behavior can be posted on the internet for many thousands of people to see. If you're not going to allow that, then what is the motivation for them to treat customers/patients fairly?

I don't believe you can require someone to sign away their right to free speech. In at least some states you can't legally require someone to sign away any of their rights. That doesn't stop people from trying. I've seen it tried and then used as a stick to try to convince someone they can't file a lawsuit. I've had it tried against me. Fortunately, I knew that part of the contract was crap from the get go and told them up front. One of the first things a judge does is go through the contract and scratch out all the illegal parts and see if what's left is enforceable and germane to the case at hand.

The Dr. does have the right to sue for defamation if the guy lied. She can't legally stop him from telling the truth. The company the developed the contract needs to do some explaining to their customers. It sounds like the Dr in question got some lousy legal advice from this company. That lousy advice is going to cost her too. I think she has a good case against the company to recoup her losses this trial is going to cost her.

Everyone needs to realize that contracts are not always totally enforceable. You can't for instance use a contact to break the law. (I'll loan you $100.00 and if you don't pay me back by the 1st I'll kill you type thing.)

Junicon

Carry a bottle of antibacterial lotion, problem solved.

I also like how you slam Bizzer for using an anecdote and then do so yourself, classic!

But it certainly makes more sense to complain, and to think they did not change it right away for you and ask you if the air temperature of the store was OK with you.

What would we do if we did not have an online forum to complain about the water temperature in a courtesy bathroom at the supermarket?

This is the problem with America.

Obviously this dentist cares about their reputation, but instead of actually working on their customer service, they decided to game the system with unconstitutional flim/flam. Here's to hoping this dentist and the other kazillion dishonest businesses fold because of people writing and reading reviews about them.

And there should be laws against companies soliciting dollars for unearned virtual reputations, especially when they advise clients to something immoral and/or illegal.

time to go review Dentist Stacy Makhnevich

GneisenauI don't believe you can require someone to sign away their right to free speech. In at least some states you can't legally require someone to sign away any of their rights.

Wrong, it's done zillions of times each day, they are called non-disclosures. It's how companies, or Herman Cain, keeps people from speaking of their bad deeds for cash. While they aren't actual forbid from speaking, they will be released of what is usually some sort of settlement should they decide to talk.

I do not use any form of online reviews about a business. I will look at the online reviews about a product but to form an opinion about a business from one or two online rants is seriously screwed up.

My father told me good advise.... don't believe anything you only read about and only half of what you see.

I don't care who you are. Provide me with bad service and I will speak my truth to the entire Universe. Accountability and professionalism can not be denied by a mere contract. I wonder sometimes however, due to the competitive nature of the MD profession if false and negative reviews are given by peers.

@ Scott - You are correct. thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't considering non-disclosures in my post because they are a bit of a different animal that what I was speaking of. I should have mentioned them. This Dr. wasn't making him sign a non-disclosure agreement though and I don't think a non-disclosure can be used for something like this. Aren't non-disclosures used for specific examples? (I.e. I forgot to carry the one and so messed up your tax return. In exchange for me paying you for your fines and interest to the IRS and some extra, you don't tell anyone I messed up your return. Not if I ever screw up your return you can't tell anyone.)

I read online reviews but always with a grain of salt. That beings said, after being scammed by a dentist (no, I never posted a review about it), I might just avoid any dentist with such warnings just to be safe. I do think such things can damage their business.

And the AMA would do what exactly?

The patient could have simply got out of the chair and walked to another dentist...or not signed the form.

Bizzer - what you describe is obviously abuse of the site, but doesn't mean that others don't post legitimate gripes about business encounters. It's like reading reviews anywhere, a person who is seriously checking for the input of others and has half a brain in their head can tell when someone is exaggerating a bad review or just being vicious about it. I rely often on the review of others for products and businesses, though I don't go to Yelp.

The bottom line is, we all have the right to post both complains and kudos anywhere we want. If someone posts something that is untrue though, the business has the right to sue for defamation. But trying to gag patients from posting negative comments is ludicrous. The majority of people aren't going to waste their time writing something negative online about their doctor or dentist if it isn't true.

I have plenty of complaints about my experience with various doctors. My biggest one is that nearly every one seems to think that their time is more valuable than mine and I've had to wait nearly an hour after my scheduled time to be seen. I don't care about all the reasons and excuses, how they are just trying to fit in an abundance of patients, or whatever - if the reason I am left sitting in a waiting room for 20, 30, 40, 60 minutes isn't because of a real medical emergency, than the message I'm getting is that my time is disposable and I don't appreciate it. And if I want to go online to Yelp or any other site and mention this in conjunction with the doctor's name, that is my right.

I agree that online reviews are patently useless, but trying to muzzle patients is simply a ridiculous waste of time. It's utterly impossible in this country, in the internet age, and that's all there is to it.

What I really don't get is why this or any other dentist/doctor would come to the asinine conclusion that getting a signature on a contract that in effect POINTS OUT that there may have been problems with other patients, isn't itself a self-defeating exercise in futility. They might as well say "Oh yeah, and if my work on you sucks, you're out of luck, bub." Gee, as a patient, that gives me the warm-and-fuzzies all over!

I went to work for KBR in Iraq, your forced to sign a contract stating you can only go to arbitration, you can not sue them, if you want the job - you dont find that out till you have been through the week long training in Houston. I had problems during my third deployment with them and then went through all the steps to resolve it, mediation and then arbitration. I lost as it was very expensive and no lawyer will take an arbitration on with out cash up front as they cant really collect through arbitration. KBR would give nothing through discovery and there was no way to force them. All of these companies are taking away any rights we have and the politicians and buddy buddy judges are letting them.

@Bizzer: You'd have some excellent points except that in this case you don't. I can hardly imagine dentists hiring shills to badmouth other dentists at online review sites. And, this guy is no dentist. He's a patient.

I've heard about fake reviews on these sites, but they tend to be fake positive reviews - which are pretty easy to spot.

When it comes to the nutcases out there, they're also fairly easy to spot. If someone or something has 27 positive reviews and 1 negative rant, it's pretty clear that the negative was either a one-off or was written by one of those knuckleheads that just won't be satisfied. The bottom line is that you can't just read ONE review and accept it as gospel; you need to read several and get a bigger picture.

Bizzer, I have to agree with you to a certain extent. My husband is a dentist and we own our practice. We opened at the same time as another dentist in our area who was using a "consultant". One day, I randomly checked Yelp because I heard it was a good place to put our profile. To my surprise, we had a rating of 1 star by 7 different people. When I clicked on their profiles, ALL the names were names of people at our competitors office or their consultant's office. And they were all posted within a week of eachother. Then I went to our competitors reviews and they miraculously had seven 5 star reviews all the same week! (Note: our competitor wasn't smart enough to even use fake names). Anyway, I contacted yelp and they promptly took the fake reviews down and banned the user names. But the best part, they showed that our competitor had seven 5 star reviews that were removed for "violating terms of service." I'm sure any consumer can figure that out.

But I also have to say... the dentist in this story is an IDIOT! Who in the world would make their patients sign something like that? I didn't even know those forms existed. And to be honest, if I were a patient, I would contact the local state dental association vs the ADA. I know that at least in my state, a dentist would probably be reprimanded for such a contract and a letter would be sent out to all the other dentists to not do something like this. If anyone ever has a complaint against a dentist, either contact the local state dental association or contact your state's Dept of Regulatory Agencies which overseas all the medical professionals. But if you are a good dentist that treats your patients with respect, you won't have to worry about bad online reviews or complaints to agencies.

Miker is right. I would bank that there are way, way, way more fake positive reviews online than fake negative ones.

If you don't want to sign the contract, don't sign it.

Find a different Dentist or Doctor.

But if you sign the contract, then you must abide by the terms of it.

I don't get why people sign something, then act like their rights were violated.

You signed it!

This is a huge problem in the US. It leads to even more costly litigation. And it created a massive recession when people did the same thing with their home loans.

Again for the morons - if you can't abide by the terms of a contract, don't sign it.

This patient didn't lose their right to sue the dentist for malpractice or for billing errors.

So if he wanted to sue the dentist, why didn't he sue over that?

Because he really didn't have a case! He just wanted to slander the dentist.

We have no idea if anything he said was true. And medical privacy laws prevent the dentist or doctor from defending themselves.

No one forced him to sign the contract or to go to that dentist.

Within hours, the complaint filed by the advocacy group Public Citizen had prompted the company that designed Makhnevich’s contract to advise dentists and doctors to stop trying to muzzle negative comments posted on online sites such as Yelp, RateMD.com and others.

"Public Citizen" founded by Ralph Nader - American Hero.

Some of the people posting here are overmedicated - they clearly have never been at a doctors office in pain. One does not leave and hope to find another doctor -- you want the problem fixed.

And for the posters that condemn all reviews because some are bogus -- it sounds like you have been able to identify those reviews that are garbage (same comments posted for multiple locations, complaints about the water temperature, etc). If you are smart enough to separate the garbage reviews from non-garbage, why would you not use the non-garbage ones to help you make decisions? Sounds to me like paid shills (trolls) posting for an agenda again.

Ryan,

A person can not sign away their legal rights. Such a document is not legally binding. What if every business in the world decided to have this "agreement" as part of the cost of doing business with them? Consumers would have no recourse. You're wrong legally and morally on this one.

Bizzer, what about the terrible businesses that post multiple reviews, which are obviously false. I've seen some pretty glowing reviews for businesses that I know are horrible. A gym near me in particular comes to mind. After reading the reviews I knew for certain that the managers had written the posts because there's no way a paying customer would have.

my dentist deosn't make me sign any such agreement, I'm happy to say

however, at every visit, she and her assistant perform an extraction on my wallet and remove all of my cash and credit cards before they agree to treat me...

They can always do what a local business owner did here. He sent out an e-mail to every customer in his database soliciting good reviews to drown out the bad review. I went to check it out and found about a thousand good reviews posted in 1 day. Had to dig pretty far to find the bad one.

Attention all! You worried about being gagged? You need to be worried about medical malpractice reform! Republican politicians are trying to take away your right to sue your Dr. when they chop off the wrong leg in surgery! You need to stand tall and scream to the heavens NOT to allow this BS to pass in your state! I am CRIPPLED because of the medical malpractice and negligence of a Dr but guess what? I cant sue her because my state (LOUISIANA) has these laws with a cap on medical liabilty! It will cost me more to sue her than the maximum damage I could get from a long drawn out lawsuit! I would end up OWING more than I could possibly get, even if I got the MAX award!! Get smart people and PROTEST!!!!!!!

TraceyG,

Excellent post, that is exactly what businesses should be doing. If they have satisfied customers then they should be encouraging them to make their satisfaction known.

Every time I've had surgery or been hospitalized I've had to sign a form saying the doctors and hospital are not responsible for the outcome of the treatment or any wrong doing. That's from dozens of doctors and 5 different hospitals. It was either that or not be treated at all. Once was when my life was in danger. I hated signing the forms but I felt I didn't have a choice. When the choice is sign or take a chance that you'll die you sign your name. I've always assumed this form was common to all hospitals and doctors in the US since every one I've been to with 100 miles of my home has had me sign one.

Now everyone knows that this dentist and lousy, and a thief, so don't go to them. I think it's a great idea to have a forum to gauge doctors. I've been to some truly marvelous doctors over the years, and some real quacks.

What people need to remember is that 50% of all the doctors practicing today graduated at the lower 50% of their class. It's good for others to have this info.

I agree, Janine. What makes the medical profession so much better then a car dealer? They are in the service industry. If they give bad service, they deserve bad reviews. I hope she lands a great career filing papers for a good doctor/dentist after this.

In Europe there is no malpractice.

Think about that one lefties!

You cannot sue your Doctor under Gov't run Healthcare in Europe.

You can sign your "rights" away.

Otherwise there would be no plea bargans in criminal trials.

No Pre-Nuptual agreements.

Please people, try to think.

And ask yourself, why didn't this guy just go to another dentist? What, is there only one dentist left in NY? Did your liberal regulations and outrageous malpractice judgements run them all off?

Again, this guy has the money to sue over not being able to complain - but didn't have the money to sue over malpractice or billing errors?

Can anyone explain this?

No one has so far.

The logical conclusion is that they didn't do anything wrong. Clearly he would have sued them over if his complaints had any merit.

And what kind of idiot leaves his complaint up at the cost of $100 per day? Couldn't he have just taken it down when they first asked him to? He would have faced no fine at that point. Obviously he isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.

And we only have one side of the story. I'd have no problem with them not having this contract if the doctors or dentists could also go online and complain about bad patients.

Heck, 30% of Hospital Patients don't pay! Shouldn't they be able to post who doesn't pay?

What happened to the doctor's and dentist's right to free speech?

RYAN In Texas- your redneck roots are showing! I guess it is true- the humidity breeds stupidity!

@ whatthetruth52

I was taught these words...do not believe everything you read, hear, and see. I taught the same words to my children.

Not to bash teachers, but the worst cases of this lesson were the outlandish things my children were told by elementary school teachers. If it appears it may be an untruth I taught my kids to research, research, research until you find the truth.

I have to say the most outlandish thing I was ever told was by a veterinarian. A supposed professional, right? When I asked her why dogs have anal sacs she said it was because dogs evolved from skunks and it was a carry over. I managed to keep a straight face while telling her I had no idea how she managed to graduate college and vet school. I told her she was full of what comes out of a dog's anal sacs and that she was fired as my vet. This was a decade or more ago before social media, but I managed to spread the word effectively enough that it wasn't long before she closed shop and left town.

People know that online reviews aren't necessarily the most reliable things in the world and that you have to filter out the crazies from people that genuinely had a bad experience. Its just a review - not a debate. It doesn't need to be balanced and have the doctor's opinion of what happened. If a doctor has dozens of bad reviews then rather than trying to suppress his patients' opinions he should focus on being a better doctor.

Ryan in Texas, the doctors' and dentists' rights to free speach were taken away from them by the government via privacy laws. I would like to know if the dentist in question even handles her own billing to be aware of the problems the patient had, as the medical specialists I've always dealt with have third party billing to keep their costs down. There's a very good chance the patient in this case is angry at the wrong party, his dentist, due to a mix-up by a third party. I've had this happen to me, which has always been easily resolved after I contacted the billing company and provided copies of my receipts.

As a doctor myself, I am VERY aware and cognizant of my local reputation. My entire practice thrives on my personal reputation with my local neighbors.

So what re-course do I have when I have a patient who gets upset over something that is beyond my power to affect and flames me on one of these online sites?

When one deals with the public at large, you will inevitably encounter someone who is simply not rational or fair in their dealings. I've seen this many times. I have had to "fire" several patients over the years because they were noncompliant, or blatantly rude, or harrassing my staff, etc. My favorites are the ones who get angry with me because their insurance will not cover certain services (that were fully disclosed before treatment took place!) and proceed to blame me!!

Our healthcare system is a very hostile environment for doctors. I understand that society in general does not see this, but it is true. We are constantly under attack from regulations, insurance companies, dirty lawyers, and the occasional sociopath.

I agree that a gag contract is bordering on ridiculous, but when these websites offer no means to re-course, what are doctors (or anyone else) supposed to do to protect their genuine reputation? I'm a good, honest doctor, just like the vast majority of professionals in my industry. Who stands up for us?

So Ryan, did you miss the part that the guy was in pain when he went to the dentist and needed something done immediately? How long would it be for him to get an appointment with another dentist? Do you understand that having someone sign a contract under such conditions is considered duress?

In the article it also states that the website refused to take down the complaint. That would suggest that the patient may not have been able to retract the complaint after a certain period of time even if he wanted to.

There are remedies for billing errors that do not require being sued. I don't believe he was making a malpractice claim either. He is suing to get rid of a contract that is costing him $4600, a contract that could very well be illegal.

Also, doctors in Europe can be sued...it just happens a lot less than in the States. Where do you get your information?

........ founded by Ralph Nader - American Hero.

Total BS. Nader = penultimate American moron. Unsafe at any speed.

J Heron - Nearly every doctor in Europe with Gov't healthcare carries no malpractice insurance.

So how big a deal are malpractice suits in those countries - virtually non-existant. Otherwise they would have to insure against them.

Which would be just what I said.

As for reading the article - didn't you get that the websites refuse to take down the comments based on the doctor or dentist asking them to do it? The person who posted it can request their post to be taken down.

You can do the same at Newsvine - although no one does it.

And why won't anyone address the issue of him suing over not being able to complain (as per his agreement) vs. suing for actual malpractice or billing errors?

Doesn't it strike anyone as odd that he has no case, but still wants to complain?

Seriously, if he was harmed, do you think he would sue? Of course this guy would.

And the Federal Gov't taking Doctors and Dentists free speech rights away in exchange for allowing them access to Federal Payments, is the exact same type of contract as the dentist made the patient sign.

Doesn't anyone get the irony?

Why does no one call that duress?

So if we are going to muzzle their rights to complain, why can't they do the same?

There is no law against it.

It is a valid and legal contract to agree not to disclose information or to otherwise disparage a company. Those contracts are enforced all the time against former employees who sign documents just like this one.

Ryan,

What's your point? You think businesses should be able to have an agreement, as part of doing business with them, in which if they screw you, you can't sue or even talk about it? You are against consumer protection? You want consumers to be at the whim of businesses? I don't understand...do you own a business yourself?

There have been many examples given of good businesses who don't use these agreements. I agree with the people who say that if a business forces its customers to concede their rights, that business is probably lousy and doesn't deserve protecting.

Consumers first.

I think that the Dentist or Doctor has every right to require a contract concerning slander. Slander alone is basis for a lawsuit. If someone doesn't want to sign a contract to be treated, then go somewhere else. All the sue happy slanderers should get their own practice and support/treat all those who don't want to sign contracts.

Indy Patriot, One has to wonder how many of these patients that you have "Had to fire for being rude to the staff or being non-compliant" were held to a different standard (illegally discriminated and retaliated against) because they had the nerve to question you.

As an old RN I have seen this happen time after time. Health care professionals are not all angels.If a customer catches one doing something that shows incompetence or lack of ethics the customer should immediately get a copy of their medical records, fire the quack, obtain a new health care provider,if you live in an area where there is an ol'boy network don't tell the new provider anything about the relationship with the provider that you fired, and THEN the customer can voice their concerns about what happened with the first provider.

A lot of unscrupulous educators,cops, and at least one judge have recently been busted abusing someone when one of their victims recorded them. Apparently more customers need to start doing the same thing to health care "professionals" who the customer has an uneasy feeling about.

@Ryan,

I guess Texans don't get out much. Your screed was full of lies and distortions.

1) There is no single healthcare system in Europe. It varies from fully government run (such as in the Scandanavian countries) through partially government and privatized (such as England's) or privatized (like Germany's.)

2) Physicians in Europe generally do not carry malpractice insurance because most are employed by companies such as hospitals or by the government. In most cases in Europe, malpractice insurance is provided by the government as "self-insurance" which dramatically lowers premiums.

3) Physicians certainly can be and are sued for malpractice in Europe. But European malpractice rates are much, much lower than in the U.S. and therefore malpractice lawsuits are also fewer. Remember that medical malpractice, when aggregated, is the fifth leading cause of death in this country and isn't even in the top ten in any European country.

4) Physicians in this country routinely have you sign papers that give them full and uncontested ownership of your medical records and usually have gag restrictions in them. But exactly how twisted does your mind have to be to see this as physicians giving up their free speech rights. For that matter, the entire medical malpractice system is nothing more than a scam in this country to keep bad physicians' licenses intact through a convoluted settlement process. Less that 5% of all medical malpractice cases ever go to court. In Europe, settlements are rare and virtually all malpractice cases go to court with a frequent result that the wrong-doer loses their license to practice.

5) The people who will turn you over to collection the quickest are the for-profit medical industry. They are also the quickest to put black marks on your credit records. Over half the bankruptcy cases in this country result from huge unanticipated medical bills and 40% of those people have insurance. This is not the case in Europe.

6) In this case it is not the patient who is suing. It is the dentist who is sueing to try to collect $100 a day in "fines" for the patient expressing displeasure with the dentist's work --- and especially with the dentist claiming over $8,000 for work that was never done.

Not all physicians and dentists are bad people, but a significant number are much more concerned with money than with patient care. The average starting income (pay and benefits) for a starting physician is $254,000 after making $40k average as an intern and $70k as a resident. Not bad when you consider that almost no physicians have an actual college degree.

Your contention that somehow the dentist involved is giving up free speech rights by not being able to muzzle the personal opinions or reporting of fraud by a patient shows a lack of critical thinking skills that is astounding.

The sound reason is that the health care providers can not refute anything said, unlike any other service provider who can. There are plenty of other checks and balances. Every state in the nation regulates every type of medical provider and has laws against fraud. These agencies can conduct a proper investigation and determine if the complaint is valid.

I have worked in healthcare for years and it is not as easy as filing a complaint. Some hospitals, like the IHS one I go to, are federally protected against malpractice suits so they can literally sew someones legs together and not have to admit fault or settle or see litigation. Medicare/Medicaid providers are often given the same immunity as there are few who accept such a form of insurance these days and as such are often given favorable treatment. They are not fun facts, but they are real.

I had a tubal ligation, they only half stiched an incision closed, made 5 total (2 more than the agreement I signed allowed for admitedly by the Dr) and when I went to the ER 4 days later with a severe infection I was given an ace bandage to wrap for swelling and Ibuprofin 800mg for the discomfort. I went to another hospital in desperation and was immediately put on IV antibiotics and in the next 2 weeks when the infection was still out of control I had surgery to reopen and seal the site. Funnily enough, I have Primary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis, was diagnosed at the IHS hospital and it was all over my records what an infection risk I was and I was still ignored. I sought legal advice after contracting MRSA from the lack of treatment and being kicked off the ImmunoSupressants I rely on for controling the MS and was told by the hospital I have no legal right to file suit. We tried and their position was upheld despite what the Judge called demonstrable ill treatment on the hospitals behalf. No Sanctions for the Dr either, she is still there and has not missed a beat while I was out of the office for 6 weeks.

We need the sites to inform others of such negligence. Some will use it as a place to take out a grudge, but we cannot take all of the valid issues down and ignore them because a few are flawed or personal. As my mom used to say, that is cutting off your nose to spite your face. Let each judge for themselves but you cannot support stifling free speech unless you are willing to sacrafice your own. My opinion is as valid as yours is, and much like they do on the comment sites like yelp we are equally sharing our respective opinions. I will never say you have no right to state what you think, but do not assume you can do so to me or anyone else unless you are willing to stop sharing your opinions as well which I would never presume to ask of you.

There was nothing in the article about bad care, the moron was pissed about having to sign the contract.

Wally......uh-huh......let's have you overcharged by 4,000 and see who starts acting like an idiot.

Wally-1853299 - no, he was mad about having been charged the amount his insurance should pay because the dentist's office staff billed the wrong company and then refused to give him the paper work so that he could submit the billing himself - which , by the way, is not uncommon so it's ridiculous that they refused. He had every right to be mad. He got the dentist's attention though, didn't he?

The sound reason is that the health care providers can not refute anything said, unlike any other service provider who can.

Any other service provider technically "can" hunt down reviews and rebut them, but they don't! I've read hundreds of restaurant reviews and car dealership reviews from various sites, and have never seen a rebuttal posted by the company. Besides, every reader knows that any person can post any review for any reason, and that HIPAA prevents refutation, so they take it with a grain of salt. You can't assume that everyone believes everything they read, and therefore we must police the Internet for any misinformation. Besides, a good doctor/dentist will have enough good reviews (and few enough bad ones) to give readers a sense of what to expect.

There are plenty of other checks and balances.

They are costly and time-consuming. If you expect patients to shell out a sum of money and pursue a burdensome ordeal, then you might as well hold doctors/dentists to the same expectations: let them go through the costly and time-consuming ordeal of suing their patient for libel, if that is in fact what the review contains. It makes much more sense to make it a business expense than to throw this burden on an individual.

Here's some reality for you - Yelp is in the business of extortion. They are not consumer advocatates, they are racketeers. You don't know this dentist or her abilities or morals, just an angry guy who obviously didn't brush his own teeth. If he was uncomfortable with her agreement, he could have left - the yellow pages are full of dentists. He had a toothache, not a life threatening emergency-it is obvious, however, that his lawyer, Levy, is a pretty slimy liar. Is that on Yelp? But you unemployables here have aided in ruining her reputation and don't even know her - how would you like it if this was happening to you?

I'm glad I read your post .. was going to say the same thing! :)

There was nothing in the article about bad care, the moron was pissed about having had to sign the contract

Wally-1853299

If you can read, you can succeed.

There were plenty of references to bad service in the article. After all, the gentleman never complained of bad treatment. He complained of arrogant incompetence and fraud in her back office. Then, when the dentist was stupid enough to attack him he sued her.

I can't say I'm surprised though. She was obviously trying to do business on the cheap. Lawyers are not nearly as expensive as the consequences of not using them when doing business.

d

Problem is that physicians cannot defend themselves due to patient confidentiality.

No, that's not really true. I'm a healthcare provider and you wouldn't believe the crap people pull on us. It is not at all unusual for people to refuse all recommendations or be 100% noncompliant and then turn around and blame the healthcare providers for a poor outcome. It's also not unusual for people to be abusive or imagine slights. I'm fortunate to never have had complaints about me posted online but I have seen some truly awful and ludicrous complaints posted about colleagues and they are unable to refute those comments, in part because of legal restrictions and in part because we are expected to "be above" that.

Take online reviews with a boulder of salt. There is likely much more to the story than what the poster has written.

Wally-1853299 - Ya, he was upset to have been asked to sign that contract, as many of us would be, but the reason he posted the comments was that he'd been charged the amount his insurance should pay because the dentist's office staff billed the wrong company and then refused to give him the paper work so that he could submit the billing himself - which , by the way, is not uncommon so it's ridiculous that they refused. He had every right to be mad. He got the dentist's attention though, didn't he?

sami-2503218

The doctors who need such a form are the ones who have bad service to hide.

I wonder if Conrad Murray had MJ sign one of those babies?

The thing about all of this is that if you give and get good, decent and reasonable service, then chances are you won't have a problem with a review. If it's competitor writing a bad review, then HIPAA is not involved because it's not a patient review. Of course, bad apples exist everywhere, and we all take them with a grain of salt. However, consistent bad reviews should set off alarms with any customer.

This is a case where the providers need to have some rights as well. Unfortunately, they can't respond (because of HIPPA) when patients post disparaging comments about them - whether or not they're deserved. This is a situation that needs to be fixed with legislation AND litigation. These days there are FAR too many people who want to complain - truthfully and otherwise - without regard to others' rights or welfare. The plain fact is that there are LOTS of dentists and doctors available to treat whatever problem you may have. If you don't like the one you have - for whatever reason - vote with your pocketbook and go find another one you do like. There's no question that the "contract" was poorly thought out - and probably poorly drawn. There's no question it was unenforceable under the First Amendment. And there's no question that the results are a waste of court time and resources in an era of major corporate malfeasance in other areas of our society. Let's maintain a little perspective and sue the bastards who are bullies and who deserve it, and walk away from the ones who are just trying foolishly or unreasonably trying to protect themselves from frivolous lawsuits with stupid or unconstitutional demands.

So your dentist friend violated the HIPAA law by telling you all of this, then? Hmmm..

Actually on this site. The Doctor can in fact respond. Not about a medical procedure. But when complaints of being billed fraudulently they can respond and say this or that happened by mistake and it was fixed and there side of the story. Just like when checking a persons selling record on Amazon of Ebay. Check the hostory. See the sellers reply to bad reviews.

As far as people using it for a grudge. If 50 reviess are up and half are bad I will take notice. Generally if I use a service that can be reviewed even if its 5 or 6 replies and 1 is bad the others may be good and I can weigh them all. When complaining about being over billed and bad service. And then being charged for making the comments that shows me a place way to concerned about bad publicity. Word of mouth is still best way to get business. If this 1 man complained but many others had good things to say it also prob would not be a problem. The dentist did more harm in the reaction and by making people sign away rights to complain if their is bad service. They seemed to like to copyright and keep statements up of any positive reviews. And Hippo laws are only for the medical treatment. Not a sham in billing. They can most definitely respond. They can even say patient XX by initials had a billing mistake corrected. Or in this case say the patient violated terms of the dentists office not to let people know about billing problems and see how that works as a reply.

Even if it is about billing it is not prudent for a doctor to respond. Privacy laws can include disallowing the doctor to acknowledge that a certain person is a patient of theirs. A lawyer could argue that the patient has already given up this right because they voluntarily declared they were a patient in the process of writing a review, but I don't think a lot of doctors want the risk.

I am in a diagnostic medical field and I hear patients complain all the time about the "incompetent" doctors or "rude" nurses who didn't know what they were doing and botched their care. Most of the time, these ppl have absolutely no idea what they are talking about and if anyone botched their care, it was they themselves for not listening or following their doctors orders. They do not understand and they think the web or their next door neighbor are better practitioners of medicine than the doctor. Don't really understand why this is-they probably would never dream of telling their mechanic they were wrong but despite knowing nothing or next to nothing about their own body, they insist the doctors and nurses are "quacks". As stated in other posts, the doctors have no recourse due to HIPAA. I can understand where it would be advantageous to have a review, but when you are dealing with healthcare, unfortunately non-practioners know NOTHING and here in America, we think that there should be a pill or medicine or treatment to fix anything wrong-if it isn't fixed, then the doctor is an idiot. Bottom line...don't rely on medical reviews for anything more than vague information.

The concern of medical/dental practitioners is that when a patient slams them on a review site, because of HIPAA patient confidentiality rules, they cannot respond to those complaints on Yelp or other review sites without breaking HIPAA rules. So they just have to sit there and take it.

So what? Welcome to the world of owning a business in the Internet Age! Any one can post anything, and it may or may not be true. And readers know this when they read those sites. As far as not being able to respond... well most businesses don't respond anyway, and it just looks tacky when they do. If there is serious misinformation, posted maliciously, and it is unfairly impacting a businesses, then they can sue for libel.

Why should dentists and doctors be able to take the easy way out and order their patients to "shut up and take it" when something goes wrong? Which, in this case, it clearly did.

So..after reading all the comments thus far, the only complaint is that these 'posts' that are 'damaging' to a physician are on the internet? They're ok with those 'damaging' verbal blasts, as long as they're not posted on the internet??

Get real, medical 'professionals'....patients really have no recourse when they have a complaint (whether real or imagined) other than to the Licensing Board within their state - and helloooooo.....thats run by DOCTORS! No real surprise here...the medical profession is the original 'old boy's club', and believe me, they cover each other's a$$es very well. It doesn't really matter to them if the complaint is legit, because in the old boy's club, you cover your brother's a$$ now, cause he'll cover yours later. Facts are irrelevant.

Really, lits a very stinky set up.

Welcome to the world of business...its about time someone can actually speak up, and speak their minds. If the average Joe doesn't have the mental capacity to read these 'reviews' with a grain of salt, then does that physician really want those people as patients anyway? I say, no big loss.

The alternative is going to the legal profession, and being no real lover of lawyers, they do have their place. They seem to be the only group out there that can actually make doctors LISTEN...and they're the only one's that can right a wrong (monetarily).

Trust me...lawyers are sharks, but then, so are medical 'professionals'.

Really? First think about the details of THIS case; it's outrageous. Then keep in mind that the negative comments posted, were not about the care of service, but how the dentist office overcharged, and then submitted bills to the wrong insurance company, and then wouldn't try to resolve the situation. And finally keep in mind that before this, these things like this were worked out, in the medical industry.

If the dentist had required a signature during the paperwork on the first visit....as opposed to when a patient was in extreme pain, then it might not be under duress. But this dentist is terrible.

It sounds like his first visit was the visit when he had the toothache. The article states that he is a Maryland man suing a NYC doctor, so he may have been on vacation or something. We also don't know all of the facts of the case. It is possible he filled out some information incorrectly, or checked the wrong box somewhere. When the article says the dentist refused to provide him the records we don't know if that was an absolute refusal, or if they refused to provide the records unless he requested them in person, or paid 10 cents a page to have them copied (both requirements some offices have).

I used to work in a medical office as a do-everything assistant. We were a government subsidized clinic which means we couldn't refuse to treat anyone, and thus got a lot of people who couldn't afford or had been discharged from other clinics. FREQUENTLY we would get people calling and making appointments saying their old doctor refused to refill their prescription for xyz . When we called their old office for their records it was not uncommon to hear that the doctor had refused to refill the prescription because the patient was 3 months over due for an appointment, or was months behind on their bill, or was going through a controlled medication much faster than they should be. Not just pain meds, but ADHD, anxiety and sleep medications too.

I learned that "refused" often means "refused to do it my way" so I almost never believe a complaint that says someone refused to do something.

Really, MEEEEE? Do we even KNOW the details of this case? The dentist can't respond because of the previously-noted HIPAA restrictions. We only have the plaintiff's version of events. And the comments noted in the article don't specify what his complaint is - he refers to being "scammed" and calls the dentist out personally for not being a "decent" human being.

I do NOT know the specifics of this case, so I won't pass judgment. And I am not in favor of attempts to stifle free speech. But honestly, some of the online review sites are ridiculous. People will - and do - complain about anything and everything. Given the restraints of HIPAA, maybe medical (dental) review sites need to require a little more - like details, instead of just one-liner slams.

Makhnevich had overcharged him by about $4,000 for his care, submitted his records to the wrong insurance company and then refused to provide copies of the records so he could submit them correctly himself.

The dentist DID have a have a chance to respond. She could have listened and attempted to work with the patient...but didn't. It didn't have to get to this situation. This dentist seems more concerned about control and her image, rather than the patients.

@MarieBaar:

Don't know when you last worked in a physician's office, but .50 a page for someone's records is a steal! When I asked my PCP for a copy of my own records, I was told it would be $5.00/page (but they'd be glad to fax them over to my new PCP for free). As I had been a patient for many years, this would have run into, oh, maybe a thousand or more?

Hmm....just WHO is HIPPA protecting...? Those in the medical field are unscrupulous, not a single one of them do anything unless it benefits THEM.

And generally, they hire the most ignorant, rude people they can...for as little as they can.

Dave, I appreciate the bind you all are in, BUT if everyone in businesses such as yours had the grapes to tell the @!$%#s of the world to take their business elsewhere in your waiting rooms the word would get around that there is an expectation of personal responsibility on the part of both the service provider and the "customer". This personal responsibility in the last few years seems to have disappeared under the guise of "Political Correctness" or some other cockamamy excuse. If I were in your shoes I would forgive the first offense with a warning letter, a second miss a bill for $100 and suggestion he find another dentist, a third mis $1000, and notification that you have fired him as a patient. If this were the norm for all medical practitioners the problem would go away. People would show up on time etc.

About a year ago I had to wait past my appointment (post cardiac issue) while the doc waited on a late patient. In a loud voice I told my wife I was getting stressed and my BP was climbing (had a cuff monitor on) I told her after waiting over an hour that if I kicked the bucked to sue the crap out of the practice and file involuntary manslaughter charges - the receptionist turned several shades of pale -ran out the back door and seconds later I had more doctors in the waiting room than there were chairs! It does work both ways Dave is the point of this long blog.

Anyone with a brain knows to take online reviews with a grain of salt... primarily because satisfied customers usually don't bother going online to post a review... because they are, well, satisfied.

It tends to be just the angry people who post reviews - so overwhelmingly online reviews are going to be negative from the get go.

They do sometimes lend useful insight, and you got to make a determination whether or not it's genuine. If a particular business is rated extremely low, chances are its somewhere you want to avoid. A moderately negative rating though - is sort of the 'break even' point when it comes to online reviews - and should be considered as the 'neutral' point.

Wow! You mean you have to make $2000 a day to break even?? Or 50 to 60K a month? Your overhead must be really high. Is this just for one doctor or dentist?

That amount isn't that surprising when you start adding up all of the expenses. Take home pay for at least 2 people, (the doctor and an assistant/office person), malpractice insurance, paying the billing agency, payments for office space, durable equipment maintenance and replacement costs, disposable equipment costs, medications, continuing education, advertisement, cleaning/decontamination...you get the idea. There is also the assumption that every day will not be 100% booked, a certain % of patients will not pay, or will no show and not pay.

Unfortunately the kinds of patients that leave negative comments are usually the kinds of patients that are lucky to get treatment anywhere. This guy has no regular dentist and walks into her office for urgent care and expects her to put herself out to treat him. She should have, and probably will in the future, just say No! Let him go to the ER at a hospital see what they will charge for emergency dentistry. So many comments on these sights are made by nut cases and I bet he is one of them!

What medical professionals need is a right to comment about any comment made about them. They should have an agreement that waives patient confidentiality if online comments are made. Many of these patients are just nutbags or scammers. She fixes his teeth and he doesn't want to pay so she is the scammer? Perhaps people don't understand how much it cost to run a New York City Dental Office. I am sure he could have gotten a quote but probebly didn't want one because he wasn't going to pay anyway. We know the lawyers representing him are licensed crooks. They may be doing something legally but that is why honest people have to pay so much; because this kind of trash escalaltes costs.

Shuklack I post reviews regardless of whether I am satisfied or not, why not let people know if there's a good, ethical doctor or a great restaurant out there? There's plenty of people posting positive reviews about doctors, dentists, stores, etc., on Yelp, UrbanSpoon, Whitepages.com and other review sites. I like being helpful and praising businesses worthy of praise.

We know the lawyers representing him are licensed crooks. They may be doing something legally but that is why honest people have to pay so much; because this kind of trash escalaltes costs.

So, let me get this straight... a dentist who engages in a practice of violating the Constitutional rights of the patients is NOT a licensed crook.. but the lawyer who aids in making sure those rights are restored, and protected for future patients IS a licensed crook... yeah... perfect sense. @@

Alan, my father was an orthopedic surgeon with a good record and a modest staff. His malpractice insurance premiums ALONE were $250,000 a YEAR. That was before he had to pay his staff, pay for supplies, pay for the building he was in, and pay himself. So yes, it really can be that expensive.

Elithian, the article never suggested he didn't want to pay. It said that the dentist's office made a billing error and refused to let him submit the bill correctly. If that's the case, then he's being proactive about making his payments. What would you have him do? Shell out $4,000 out-of-pocket because the dentist's office wouldn't bill insurance correctly? People spend a lot of money on insurance premiums; they have a right to use those insurance benefits, and complain when a provider gets in the way of that.

Voiding HIPAA is a horrible suggestion! It would be hard to prove that a certain patient wrote a certain review, especially if they used a fake name or altered the details of their visit. What if John Doe complained to his girlfriend about a bad experience, and she gossiped about it to her friends, and one of them decided to post a review themselves as John Doe? Imagine how terrible it would be if a doctor saw that post, assumed the patient really wrote it, and spilled the beans about a private medical condition in an effort to refute it? There are all kinds of scenarios that could play out, in which someone other than a patient made a review. That shouldn't give doctors the liberty to post confidential information online! Wow, you didn't think that through, did you?

Working in healthcare I can say that rarely does the provider get in the way of the Ins co, but the other way around. The provider (MD, DDS, DC etc) wants too get payed and they know they have a much better chance if the ins co pays them verse a person paying cash. People first need to know thier insurance policy and not expect the providers to provide them with that information. It is THIER insurance and they are paying for it. I ca not tell you how many times insurance companies have given my staff the wrong information about coverage. Happens ALL the time. But instead of the ins co taking the blame the patient thinks the doctor is trying to rip them off. People need to take more responsibility and stop blaming the doctor when a simple phone call would tell them thier coverage.

It's funny that the right wing Obama haters really hate it when medicare dosen't pay thier whole bill. That hate Obama care, but hate even more when the Government dosesn't pay the bill..........ironic.

That's part of being an in-network provider. Your office has to deal with insurance claims and all the associated disputes. The perk is you get the business from insured patients, and usually some amount of guaranteed payment (versus being an out-of-network provider).

As an insured patient, I rarely get a useful answer from my insurance company. The trick is getting the provider to submit an identical claim; they usually pay after the second or third submission. It's also crucial for providers to be upfront about the treatment. It makes me mad when "extra" procedures get thrown in, billed for, and not covered. A radiologist once sent my x-rays to another one for a second opinion, WITHOUT MY PERMISSION. I didn't even know there was a second opinion until I was billed for it, and insurance didn't cover it. Shame on the provider.

You hear one side of the story and are ready and willing to condemn her? I hope someone treats you that way one day.

You hear one side of the story and are ready and willing to condemn her and take away her livelyhood? What is wrong with you.

hopefully a pissed off patient will just firebomb her office.....or pull her teeth out without NOS and painkillers :P......after drilling them first

Good point. However, medical treatment is often a private matter, and some may feel uncomfortable in an office where they are encouraged to "review" their experience on a public forum.

If a doctor is guilty of malpractice such as leaving an instrument inside you, his little contract agreement is not worth the paper it is written on. I would get a good attorney and see what a jury would say about such negligence in medical services.

The first amendment does not cover situations like this. Patients retain the right to sue if they really have grievance

There was nothing in the article about bad care, the moron was pissed about having had to sign the contract

Wally

How many times are you going to say he was pissed because he had to sign a contract??? He's more pissed that when he tried to resolve his bill the office was very uncooperative after they billed the incorrect insurance company and started sending him a bill...............a $4,000.00 bill. If you got a bill like that from a dentist or doctor and were trying to resolve the matter by giving them the correct insurance number you would be pissed also. It isn't just about the agreement. You have a right to vent to the Better Business Bureau if you don't like what a business has done to you. These practices are businesses also and customers should have a right to complain when they run into a problem with them.

Most of these bad reviewers don't have legitimate gripes, just simply being jerk-offs. Docs and dentists have learned that they have to have a way to get back at people who post libelous reviews.

While I agree those organizations should get involved, there are larger legal issues in play here, and it's appropriate to involve a judge. If all dentists and doctors have to work under the same rules, it's fair. I have ignored a few bad reviews and saw a particular dentist. It's only when there are several reviews complaining about the same thing that gets me to avoid a dentist. I feel like you are insulting the intelligence of consumers by saying that one bad review can haunt someone.......we're not stupid, we can ignore the crazy ones and see the relevant patterns.

Please re-read my post. I merely suggested that one bad post by an over-zealous consumer might possibly be hurtful. I didn't mean to suggest that one person alone could bring Goliath down. I would like to think that an intelligent person would rely more strongly on substantiated facts than the rant of one person.

Statistics never lie, but liars use statistics! (told to me by my college statistics professor)

Whenever I look at reviews, I always look at the percentage of positive and negative comments. It paints the clearest picture of the actual information.

It's true that for all the positive reviews a business or professional gets it's the negative ones that carry the most significance. Even if the ratio is 10:1 it's that negative one that negates all the others. That is all the more reason for professionals and businesses to have very good customer service, be open to feedback (even go out of their way to solicit any feedback) and really be committed to the quality of their service as a reflection of their reputation. It's fairly easy to have a 95% positive reputation but to get that last 5% you have to work twice as hard.

Clearly this is a case where the professional didn't feel it necessary to work any harder to satisfy her client/patient.

I couldn't agree more. The doctors and dentists most worried by negative reviews are usually the ones giving substandard treatment. Several years ago I had an unfortunate experience with a dentist. An infection didn't heal and I was treated by sending me home with expensive whitener for the upcoming veneers. I felt his attention was to the expensive cosmetic procedure rather than proper dental care. I eventually got my money back - since I was missing teeth that I had been trying to replace with a new bridge that had to be removed. I posted my experience online for others to be aware. Another dentist was having trouble with insurance companies (wanting to charge more than agreed rate) and I was not given itemized billing, which I requested. I posted that, saying as a dentist I liked her but was worried about billing issues. I didn't rant but stated the facts as I knew them. Everything else stands up to scrutiny - we don't buy TVs or cars without checking ratings, why should medical profession get to continue plying their trade without criticism?

I also had a bad experience with my dentist. I feel victimized. I never reported her, although her office manager would ask me to post to an online site to state that I had a good experience this was prior to my experience. I never would. In the end I ended up with a bad experience and never went back. I talked to the dentist and explained to her that she was over charging and she told me "It's your word against mine". She agreed not to charge me for my last visit but that was after she would make me pay for a temporary crown three times!! She would tell me "Oh I have to make another mold since your teeth shifted, so it's going to cost you" This happened three times! I asked her how could my teeth shift in two weeks? She told me it happens. I lost a great deal of money. I also told her that one particular tooth aches and she told me she would fill that tooth after she does my crown. I feel as though I have no say in the matter and am afraid to look for another dentist. I believe that most dentist are out for extreme profit and not out to care for their patients.