
I wrote a negative Yelp review and it made my life a nightmare - ytNumbers
https://nypost.com/2018/05/28/i-wrote-a-negative-yelp-review-and-it-made-my-life-a-nightmare/
======
jastanton
I was nodding along until this:

> They posted my entire medical record, including notes about my mental
> health, my bills, my insurance info, my driver’s license, birth date and
> home address,” she said.

wow. That violates HIPAA law. The counter-sue is going to be huge.

Also, I had a related issue where a doctor threatened to sue based on my yelp
review. I cut the review back to verifiable facts instead of opinion and asked
if that compromise was ok, he said it wasn't and started claiming it was
defamation. I cut off contact and that was that. I wondered if it was possible
to be dragged into court by something like this, apparently I may have dodged
a bullet. Scary stuff.

~~~
Nadya
>Wow. That violates HIPAA law. The counter-sue is going to be huge.

Basically an open and shut case too. Assuming they were smart enough to
"correct" the mistake it may not be a Tier 4 ($50,000+) violation, but instead
a Tier 3 violation ($10,000 - $50,000 per violation) of willful neglect. I'm
not sure if each violation above would be considered a single large violation
or multiple small violations ( 1 violation vs 7 violations is a major
difference in penalty cost). There's also SLAPP.

If litigation has gone on long enough to cost her $20,000 in legal fees I
can't help but feel there is a lot more to this story or my understanding of
the legal system is _completely_ out of touch...

~~~
alexbanks
You seem like you know what you're talking about. A few years ago, I got a
Facebook message from a girl that lived in my town. She said something like
"This is really weird, but did you have shoulder surgery by X doctor last
October? If so, that surgeon just did my knee and after my rehab told me that
she thought you and I would be a good match. Would you want to grab dinner
sometime?"

I was really confused. Wasn't this a HIPAA violation? If yes, what do you even
do about it? Feels like a cause for concern if your doctor is also trying to
play cupid? What should I do/have done?

~~~
Nadya
I work in a tech-related healthcare field where I'm required to undergo HIPAA
training and (often) end up needing to educate clients on potential violation
risks. Nowhere as good as a lawyer but I deal with it on a daily basis at
least. So take this as the typical "I am not your lawyer or pretending to be a
lawyer - go speak with an actual lawyer" disclaimer.

>Wasn't this a HIPAA violation?

100% yes that was a HIPAA violation and honestly anything shy of giving your
information to people who actually need it (aka: any hospital/practitioner you
visit who should be aware of your medical history) is a violation with very
few exceptions (mostly legal ones). Gossiping about patients is probably one
of the most common violations.

>If yes, what do you even do about it?

Depends how much you care and how long it has been since the event happened
and you became aware of the violation. If it happened within the last 6 months
you can report it online through the process xapata linked you. If it's been
over 6 months it's too late to report. I'm not sure if "it happened but I
didn't know it was a violation until recently" counts as a start date for the
"aware of the occurrence" limitation. Would be a great question for an actual
lawyer.

You also don't know what else could possibly have been said about you or your
medical history - so I'd keep that in mind when deciding if this violation is
a "big deal" to you personally or not.

------
AdmiralAsshat
_> “They tried to drag my start-up wine-and-spirits technology business into
it … They posted my entire medical record, including notes about my mental
health, my bills, my insurance info, my driver’s license, birth date and home
address,” she said._

That screams HIPAA violation, to me. The practice could (and should) be shut
down over it.

~~~
ceejayoz
_If_ it happened.

The story is in a tabloid, and that's such an _insanely_ egregious breach of
HIPAA that I'm a little skeptical that it played out _exactly_ like that.

~~~
confiscate
why do you blame the tabloid? The quote said "They posted my", so it looks
likely that it was the woman who said it, no?

~~~
ceejayoz
> why do you blame the tabloid?

Because a common tabloid tactic is posting _technically_ true statements in a
misleading manner.

For example, the woman's statement _could_ apply to having introduced her
medical records _into the court transcripts_ , which would be entirely normal
practice. The wording in the article leaves us thinking they uploaded her
records and driver's license in a Yelp reply or something, but I think that's
unlikely.

------
pliftkl
A better headline might read "I wrote a review on Yelp in which I accused a
doctor of committing insurance fraud on other patients that I had no actual
knowledge of, and it made my life a nightmare".

Courts have established that you can write negative reviews and that they fall
well within rights to freedom of speech. She isn't being sued for giving the
guy a one-star review and saying "This place sucks". There's one sentence she
wrote that has cost her $20k:

"I suspect that this doctor gives unnecessary procedure to a lot of people and
then charges the insurance sky high prices and no one knows the difference."

~~~
oliv__
Well, if it happens to one patient, how likely is it that this is common
practice?

Also, she started the sentence with "I suspect", which is very different from
a plain accusation.

~~~
conanbatt
You cant veil an accusation under a single adjective, come on..

It might happen to many others, but her accusation is baseless and she is
responsible for it. Suing for libel is an appropriate right.

~~~
iron0013
How is it baseless?

~~~
conanbatt
She has no evidence whatsoever that this happened to someone else.

~~~
tomtimtall
She has absolute evidence that she in fact suspects this.

------
ssijak
One thing that sticks to me when I read such articles (I am not from US) is
how ridiculously pricey medical services are. Common, 1k$ for a regular exam
that costs like 20euros in my country in private clinics?! And I read about
this ridiculous prices US so often that I am dumbstruck that people are cool
with it.

Another thing that struck me is that if you don`t have money, evil people can
just silence you by suing you (look at those court costs, 20k and counting?!)

~~~
OscarCunningham
The "prices" are moves in a game played between hospitals and insurance
providers, and don't correspond to anything real or to the amount that gets
paid. If a hospital discovers that the patient doesn't have insurance they'll
be charged the real (more reasonable) prices instead.

~~~
nambit
Millions of americans pay those sticker prices. Just because millions more
don't or get discounts doesn't change the fact that those are very real
prices.

~~~
OscarCunningham
Yes. The system is bad.

------
shanecleveland
I had a terrible experience with a vacation rental, so I left a brutally
honest review. Was aggressively met with verbal lawsuit threats. I ended up
talking with the owner quite a bit about how disappointing of an experience it
was for us. I agreed to remove the original review in replace of a less
"colorful" one. He at least said he understood some points and agreed to make
some changes. But I got the feeling it was common for him to use these scare
tactics to prevent bad reviews. And it worked. Not worth it to me to fight
this battle, so I chose not to provide another review. I just wanted to
prevent others from going through the same thing. The rental site was of no
help and said they don't get involved.

In this case, the doctors bigger concern may be insurance fraud , if
overcharging and/or performing unnecessary procedures.

~~~
win_ini
Slightly related - but gives me a chance to tell this story. Recently, I
stayed at an AirbNb with many great reviews. The guy asked me to NOT leave a
review ("We already have lots of good ones"). His issue - the reviews are used
by the county to see how often their place is being rented out.

------
jayess
Call your home/renter's insurance agent and ask them to add a "personal
injury" rider. Increase your liability limit to $1m. You'll be insured against
suits for libel/slander (assuming you aren't doing so maliciously). It'll
probably cost you another $50 a year. It's a life saver. I have a friend to
was sued, wrongfully, for defaming someone online and his insurance covered
the entire defense.

~~~
dawnerd
Just mentioned it above, but my insurance actually bills it as libel
insurance, so might have to ask for that as well.

------
mschuster91
A variation of this scam is also endemic in the German mandatory insurance
system (e.g. [http://www.ln-online.de/Lokales/Luebeck/Krankenkassen-
betrog...](http://www.ln-online.de/Lokales/Luebeck/Krankenkassen-betrogen-
Luebecker-Sonderdezernat-ermittelt)).

In contrast to privately insured people (basically, public servants, company
founders, rich and ultra rich) who get to see the bills of the medical
provider, they can bill the "common" insurance providers (GKV, Gesetzliche
Krankenversicherung) directly without the customer seeing anything of the
bill. This is, of course, ripe for abuse as no one will look if a doctor
really did a specific billed procedure on a patient, especially not something
in the 20-50€ range...

~~~
Semaphor
> In contrast to privately insured people (basically, public servants, company
> founders, rich and ultra rich)

And many self-employed people and also some middle class people. Private
insurance isn't _that_ rare here.

PS: Interesting to see LN linked ;)

------
CodeSheikh
His Yelp page is getting very active: [https://www.yelp.com/biz/joon-song-md-
new-york-2](https://www.yelp.com/biz/joon-song-md-new-york-2)

~~~
mattnewton
Streisand effect all over again[0]

[0]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect)

------
jimrandomh
The author claimed that the provider in this case committed billing fraud, by
charging the insurance for procedures that were not performed. She should
write the NY attorney general; an investigation by the State would make the
civil case a lot easier to deal with.

------
jchw
Think of how many people this business has bullied into silence before someone
with enough resources to make the news came along. For most people
(unfortunately,) $20k of expenses is bankruptcy.

------
yani
It is good to hear the other side of the story. I find it impossible for a
lawyer company to post medical records of someone else publicly since they are
supposed to know what they are doing. I am all for give power to the people
but I have seen this being abused a lot nowadays.

~~~
csomar
> They posted my entire medical record, including notes about my mental
> health, my bills, my insurance info, my driver’s license, birth date and
> home address

If this is indeed true I'm not really interested to hear the other party
story. Remember that the other party started the lawsuit and online reviews
are something to get over with (unless the woman is backed by some entity that
is going after that business)

~~~
yani
Yes. But that sentence is too obfuscated... posted where? I am a bit sceptic
because of the way the article is written around the important parts.

------
hitekker
Yelp ought to stick up for the reviewers, at least in some small capacity. I
mean, if people feel like they can't be honest in Yelp reviews without getting
sued, doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of Yelp?

I'd hate to see it become another ZocDoc, where five stars reviews are
copypasted ad infinitum.

~~~
skj
Yelp's customers are the business owners.

~~~
4ad
Yelp exists only because people trust it.

~~~
DiabloD3
Given how many times "Google is evil because it destroyed Yelp (not because
Yelp is a trainwreck)" headlines cross the HN front page, arguably, no one
trusts Yelp.

~~~
4ad
Hackers News titles are not a reflection of the society at large.

------
dqv
The case is available online through WebCivil Supreme [0] if you want to read
more about the case.

[0]
[https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASSearch?param=P](https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASSearch?param=P)

~~~
mcguire
The case name is "GREAT WALL MEDICAL P.C. vs. LEVINE, MICHELLE".

[https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASCaseInfo?parm=...](https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASCaseInfo?parm=CaseInfo&index=EQ%2FcE1kqRZ1_PLUS_y5dbxSBFQA%3D%3D&county=hK5AdsEWZTBWkrxZV7J3Bg%3D%3D&motion=M&docs=&adate=06/21/2018&civilCaseId=4DfkdU4iElJ1RJmL3_PLUS_5btw%3D%3D)

~~~
danieltillett
Having read the case I suspect the defendant is going to lose big time.

------
duked
I just went on their yelp page and was noticed a huge spike in negative review
(talk about the streisand effect...). but what surprised me was the yelp
notification: "Active Cleanup Alert

This business recently made waves in the news, which often means that people
come to this page to post their views on the news.

While we don’t take a stand one way or the other when it comes to these news
events, we do work to remove both positive and negative posts that appear to
be motivated more by the news coverage itself than the reviewer’s personal
consumer experience with the business.

As a result, your posts to this page may be removed as part of our cleanup
process beginning Tuesday, May 29, 2018, but you should feel free to post your
thoughts about the recent media coverage for this business on Yelp Talk at any
time. "

So is it like the news coverage never happened ? seems kind of disingenuous to
remove everything during that period (whatever time frame they will decide on
is interesting too)

~~~
lazyasciiart
That doesn't say "everything during that period". It sounds like they're going
to remove all the stuff like "I've never been here but they sound evil 1
star!"

------
caiocaiocaio
Yelp doesn't seem to have brought a lot of a joy into anyone's life.

~~~
PascLeRasc
I visited Spain last summer and my family would typically just walk around
where we were looking for a restaurant that seemed good, and almost always got
stuck in tourist traps with bad Americanized food at high prices. When we
started using Yelp to find places to eat we found little hole-in-the-wall
tapas places with absolutely no American influence and amazing food that we
still talk about to this day.

~~~
retromario
Yes, same here. I used Yelp during a US West Coast trip and always found good
too great places to eat near any place we drove through. The highlight was
finding an amazing, fresh Vietnamese on a concrete island in some random part
of Fresno.

Their coverage is not uniform across different countries (Germany is not bad
but still occasionally spotty) but it's a great filter of the crap
restaurants.

------
Legogris
Slightly related: There is an ongoing process of redditors being targeted in a
defamation suit by a mental health counselor in Tokyo for writing about their
experiences on Reddit:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/7resct/update_offici...](https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/7resct/update_official_gofundme_update_current_status_of/)

------
teliskr
The Yelp episode of South Park is one of the best.

"I'm a food critic with Yelp.com... umkay."

[http://southpark.cc.com/full-episodes/s19e04-youre-not-
yelpi...](http://southpark.cc.com/full-episodes/s19e04-youre-not-yelping)

~~~
rootlocus
I didn't get the feeling that this woman was the kind of Yelp reviewer South
Park were shaming.

------
dominotw
I am suprised zocdoc even allowed negative reviews. They rejected my slightly
negative review. I think reviews have to to be approved by the doctors
themselves to be posted on zocdoc since doctor knew what I wrote( without it
being published) and hounded me to resubmit a positive review.

------
wccrawford
I know someone who left a bad review and the owner of the restaurant stalked
her for years afterwards. She ended up leaving Yelp because of it.

Yelp doesn't do nearly as much as they should to protect their users.

~~~
forgot-my-pw
Didn't Yelp use to coerce businesses too to pay to get their bad reviews
"hidden"?

~~~
turc1656
Yes, yes they did/do. It's a move straight out of the mobster playbook. It's
the modern day equivalent of paying for "protection".

Yelp has also been sued by investor's for allegedly misleading them into
believing that Yelp was filtering out everything that wasn't reliable, first-
hand reviews from people who actually went to those businesses and paid for
services.

On a similar note, I believe business owners have alleged numerous times that
when they refuse to pay the extortion fees to have bad reviews removed, they
suddenly get a bunch of bad reviews all at once. Also, Yelp has seemingly had
a habit of allowing competitor's post bullshit reviews on businesses who
haven't paid them for that "service".

I don't what currently goes on, though. Maybe they have cleaned it up? But I
doubt it.

------
bobthechef
This particular case aside, I'm fairly certain that doctors in the United
States perform unnecessary procedures all the time so that they can charge
more, or drag out consultations across multiple visits to be able to charge
independently for each visit. So I wouldn't be surprised if that's what
happened here because it is so common. Medicine is a corrupt field full of
overpaid doctors. Look at how much doctors make in, say, the UK. At the same
time, wait times in the UK is pretty terrible from what I hear.

~~~
OnMyPhone
Several of the Dr's and specialists in the US write down different procedures
than what is done. I don't think it's malicious (at least to the patient), but
I think it's mainly to avoid issues with insurance companies not covering
stuff. I can see how this isn't kosher with many people though.

I have some weird issues that no one can seem to figure out, so when I go to
the Dr's, they'll sometimes take the shotgun approach. If they know that the
insurance company is going to give me flak for something, the Dr's put down
whatever is needed for insurance to cover it.

One example was when I felt a pop in my jaw after eating something. Within a
few minutes it hurt so bad that I passed out from the pain, and woke up an
hour or so later. I went to the Dr's and had them do what they do. They did a
bunch of tests and the Dr told me that he had to put down that I have "head
pains" instead of "jaw pains" otherwise insurance wouldn't cover it.

I'm not huge on the idea and I'm sure I'm paying for it in one way or another.
It is much better than paying thousands out of pocket 5+ times a year.

------
mattsoldo
Countersue the doctor. Unfortunately without a suit to conterweight theirs,
they only have upside.

And file a suit against Yelp.

------
pseudolus
Apparently (and per the terms of the stipulation electronically filed) the
parties were close to settling and in the interim she agreed to take down her
reviews that had been posted during the pendency of the action and not make
any more "disparaging" statements. I'm guessing the settlement talks fell
through. The issues are, unsurprisingly, not as black and white as the
original story makes out.

------
danso
Google cache of the defendant's now-deleted GoFundMe page:

[http://archive.is/xm4Ce](http://archive.is/xm4Ce)

Has some more details, from her side, about the alleged HIPAA violation:

> _As if that was not enough, in the very early stages of the lawsuit Dr. Joon
> Song had my medical record posted online in it 's entirety. My complete
> medical record was available publicly on the internet. My mental health, the
> details of my body even though i never took the gown off, my bills, my
> insurance details, my photo, my name, my birthday, my address and my phone
> number. All of this was posted._

> _Dr. Joon Song and his lawyers claim that because i shared the details of my
> positive blood test privately with the court (which i was forced to do to
> defend myself) I waived all rights to my privacy and there is no HIPPA
> violation and I am further a liar in stating that he had violated my HIPPA
> rights by publishing my records._

> _In addition to posting my medical records Dr. Joon Song refuses any
> amendment request . His office staff says my medical record is locked
> because he is using it to sue me. He maintains false information on my
> record to date._

Sounds like she's claiming that her medical info was posted as documents
pertaining to the lawsuit.

edit: Others have posted the case filing, in which you can find the exhibits
and affidavits. The alleged posting of medical records was not to the public
Internet, but as part of a case filing. And only after, the plaintiff asserts,
the defendant posted her own records:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17179942](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17179942)

------
pwaai
I submitted a complaint to BBB once and the business owner sent me a letter
threatening to sue.

That was the day I realized we as consumers are truly vulnerable.

~~~
Clubber
I've heard rumors that the BBB is pay to play, but I don't have any direct
experience with them.

Gotta watch what I say lest I get sued!

~~~
jayess
That is definitely the case. BBB is a scam.

------
OliverJones
Yelp is basically bad news for everybody.

The subjects of negative reviews often attack the reviewers.

And, Yelp itself attacks the subjects of positive reviews. Their sales people
call positively-reviewed small businesses and use hard-sell tactics to try to
sell them advertising.

So, for your own sake don't post negative reviews. And, for the sake of the
businesses you like don't post positive reviews.

------
pasbesoin
$20,000 as an opener.

Civil as well as criminal proceedings. I worry it's more about the money you
have to spend, especially when this differs significantly between the opposing
sides, than justice.

And, charging $1300 a visit, that doctor's going to have the spend.

Maybe, in this case, the chance of media coverage will produce a settlement
before things hit the stratosphere.

At the same time, going onto social media and using words like "crook", etc.
is... not the best approach. Stick to facts and more neutral language, and let
the reader draw their own conclusion.

But then again, more and more often, _any_ criticism seems to provoke nuclear
escalation. Not to mention the pre-emptive strike of non-disparagement
language in service contracts.

Ours is called a "knowledge economy". But a lot of self-serving interests are
bent on shutting down the knowledge.

P.S. If medical records were shared, state licensing should be looking at
pulling the doctor's license.

There's a purpose to regulation, that includes shutting down the most
egregious behavior.

Also, prosecutors should be investigating medical and insurance fraud.

Back with the wind up of our "war on terror", a _lot_ of law enforcement
resources got directed away from domestic crime including white-collar crime,
to chasing needles in the ever-bigger haystack that was being built.

Even a rich society faces limits to its resources. Especially when there are
arguments and initiatives to reduce them. (The "tyranny of big government" \--
unless it's law enforcement and the military, or is that law enforcement _as_
the military?)

In part, current domestic problems are exacerbated by the pressure and actions
to focus our resources abroad. And not in "economic aid", but in power
politics.

No one's been tending the shop. And the worst and pushiest have been taking
advantage.

------
tomohawk
Yelp is pretty bad with the negative reviews, and is sometimes used by groups
to target businesses for non business reasons.

Here's some examples of veterinarians who have have run ins with Yelp (leading
to suicide in one case), and some of the mitigations they try:

[http://veterinarynews.dvm360.com/negative-reviews-yelp-
and-y...](http://veterinarynews.dvm360.com/negative-reviews-yelp-and-your-
veterinary-clinic)

~~~
jessaustin
Lots of good advice there. When in doubt, apologize.

------
himom
She’s already won in the court of public opinion, I hope she recovers a
reasonable amount of fees and damages if her story is legit.

Always post reviews anonymously using an anonymous email address over Tor or
free WiFi.

It seems bad business to go after disgruntled customers punitively rather than
trying to correct the situation positively. There’s always some crazy
customers out there, but either way: going after them just lends them
credibility and a platform.

------
ktosobcy
One thing that annoys me about Yelp is that they pulled my information and put
this info on their site. I have absolutely no intention of being there
(working remotely, had to establish legal entity for 'freelance' work that is
already 7 years with same company). And they refuse to take down my details
(including my address) from their page…

------
eggy
I believe in free speech online, Yelp included, however, I would be factual
and concise when writing a review. The article quotes she wrote "crooked",
which means dishonest, or illegal. I am not saying there are not scammers and
bad doctors, but it's best to keep your language objective and answer after
you have emoted offline, or the legal issues have been resolved. She could
have stated that she was billed for X, but thinks she did not receive X as
defined, and did not receive sufficient clarification or verification from the
doctor. She states the doctor's office were aggressive on the phone when she
called. Per her allegation they stated she complained of pelvic pain and this
required an ultrasound. Did she complain of having pelvic pain and was given
an ultrasound? Is this covered in the annual checkup for free?

I have a bill from my daughter's pediatrician, which on first look appears to
be a double charge for a developmental evaluation (filling out 3 pages of
questions on her). I am not going to jump on Yelp and write the pediatrician
is crooked or otherwise, until I am convinced it is either a clerical error,
includes another form she had us fill out that I am unaware of is a separate,
standard billable practice, or is plain dishonest, and trying to get more
money out of my insurance company. I will admit my first reaction upon opening
the bill, hungry, late, and overworked was "This is bullshit! They are trying
to rob me!" I have been overseas for the past 8 out of 9-1/2 years, so I am
going to tread lightly until I can ascertain the doctor's intentions. I think
many people use Yelp or other online reviews as a forum for knee-jerk,
emotional reactions.

~~~
benburleson
It might be a case of the current American President devaluing the word. Seems
like it would be easy to explain away the use of "crooked" in court these
days.

------
ndesaulniers
I posted a civilized negative review and it got taken down for "not meeting
guidelines." I wonder how many other negative reviews have been taken down on
Yelp? I also wonder that's a paid feature that businesses can use?

~~~
OnMyPhone
"I also wonder that's a paid feature that businesses can use?"

I swear that I've heard about several different people paying Yelp to "remove"
(or whatever term they called it) negative reviews on their site. This was a
few years ago, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was still a thing.

------
p3llin0r3
Dr. Joon Song has never heard of the Streisand effect apparently

------
flippyhead
I love seeing bullies like this get called out and end up worse off than if
they'd done nothing.

~~~
rootlocus
Which party do you see as the bully here?

------
JumpCrisscross
Counterfactual: Dr. Soong is well-rated on ZocDoc. Curious to see how the
judge rules.

~~~
hitekker
ZocDoc explicitly limits critical reviews, implicitly removes negative ones,
and otherwise enables faking/rating-inflation:

[https://www.zocdoc.com/about/blog/for-patients/the-zocdoc-
do...](https://www.zocdoc.com/about/blog/for-patients/the-zocdoc-doctor-
rating-policy/)

> Please note that we can’t publish claims about the accuracy of a
> practitioner’s treatment and diagnosis. Those are factual matters, and to
> verify them would require extensive medical studies.

[https://nycdatascience.com/blog/student-works/web-
scraping/a...](https://nycdatascience.com/blog/student-works/web-
scraping/analyzing-zoc-doc-doctors/)

And so forth.

------
sunstone
Yeah well Yelp considers negative reviews to be their own exclusive revenue
stream.

------
baxtr
Anonymous reviews are a sort of a good thing, viewed from that end

------
hi41
Isn't a negative Yelp review protected by Freedom of speech? Inspite of that
the lady had spent a fortune defending herself.

~~~
danso
She isn't being sued for a negative Yelp review. She's being sued for alleged
libel in the form of a negative Yelp review.

------
Overtonwindow
This almost seems like a Slapp lawsuit.

~~~
ceejayoz
Maybe, maybe not. A new patient visit and a routine annual aren't necessarily
the same thing where insurance is concerned, and it's not the doc's fault if
she's got a copay/deductible.

That said, if she can prove this bit:

> “They tried to drag my start-up wine-and-spirits technology business into it
> … They posted my entire medical record, including notes about my mental
> health, my bills, my insurance info, my driver’s license, birth date and
> home address,” she said.

... they're about to get smacked _really_ hard.

~~~
yani
It does not say where it was posted and why she thinks it was them.

------
newshorts
Yang to the yin of doctors being sued by patients.

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jhowell
If you wrote a restaurant review 30 years ago and it was seen by millions,
likely the same number who saw your post on yelp, and attached your photo
along with your text, you would have been impacted. Yelp is a saw you held the
wrong way. Do we need instructional videos for saws?

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hycaria
Patients are by far the worst kind of customer to deal with. So maybe if the
costs were disclosed upfront ("I can perform an ultrasound if you have pelvic
pain, but it will cost you/your insurance xxx") we wouldn't come to such he-
said-she-said extremities. But I guess it's pure fantasy in the USA where I've
heard medical costs can be negotiated... How could they announce full price /
insurance coverage when you're about to get the exam done if it's not even
settled yet ?

~~~
mynameisvlad
Why can't the costs be disclosed upfront? Whenever I go to the dentist and I
need to have some work done, I get an estimate telling me how much it costs
and how much they expect the insurance company to cover. This isn't rocket
science, it can easily be calculated, and should be, as you said, for the
benefit of everyone.

~~~
dfsegoat
I too wonder why the MD side of healthcare doesn't work more like this in the
US.

I was actually very taken aback recently when I needed to get dental work and
was presented with costing info about 10 mins after my visit started.

It did feel a bit greasy, I must admit - but I get that the point is for
everyone to be on the same page before the procedure.

edit: I now recall that I did use Urgent Care for awhile for healthcare while
uninsured - in the US - these are basically "fixed menu" clinics. They have a
menu of services / costs for cash.

~~~
Clubber
I had a dentist present something for me to sign while I was under the
laughing gas.

