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Doctors Silencing Online Patient Reviews Via Contract
Condiment writes "Next time you're sick, take five and actually read the pile of contracts your doctor dumps on your lap, because it's becoming more and more likely that your doctors are banning patients from posting reviews on the Web. You heard that right: as a prerequisite to receiving medical care, patients are in many cases required to sign away their First Amendment rights!"
I'm not sure about the laws in other states, but here in California I refuse to sign a lot of the paperwork all of the time. I always refuse to sign the waiver that asks me to give up my rights to sue over medical malpractice.
I think that as Americans we get conditioned to sign everything and rarely think about not doing it. Every time I refuse, I get weird looks, but I've never once been denied service.
This was actually brought up my commercial law class this morning. Our professor's opinion was that it was probably legal if just a few doctors were doing it. But, if all doctors in an area were doing it and it was not possible to obtain medical care without agreeing to this, it's possible that courts may not recognize the contract, because it was a "contract of adhesion".
Every time you post an article on Slashdot, I kill a server. Think of the servers!
Well, one way to counter a non-compete is to make a counter offer that stipulates a paycheck for every normal pay period that is equal to what I would have gotten for working here, up to however many years.
Then you proceed to use that money for _not working_ to go back to school and get a better degree.
Please stop claiming First Amendment rights when the government is not involved.
No, and I'm not going to stop until the government passes a law saying I can't. :P
The enemies of Democracy are
Dude, been there, done that, except for the getting fired part.
Had a guy go off one time on the phone about Clinton's "cigar" and "I didn't have sexual relations" thing when I was on the phone with him. He asked me my opinion and I said I didn't really care, as his getting (or not getting) some nookie didn't have anything to do with the state of the country. He got really irritated that I thought that (should have said I have no opinion, in hindsight) and then started lambasting democrats, Clinton, etc, complete with f-bombs and all that. I just hung up on him. Not because I'm a Clinton apologist, but because I didn't care.
When they asked me about it, I said I accidentally hit the release button on my headset. They wanted to punish me for pissing off the customer, but since they couldn't prove the hangup was intentional, they couldn't. Win-win. I got to hang up on a butthead and received no punishment for it. (I quit that company not long after that) :)
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I think that people have the wrong idea about contracts. Contracts don't make it so you CAN'T do something, they just make it so there are possible consequences for it. If I signed a waiver and then posted about the doctor this merely (possibly) gives him the right to take legal action for it. But in that regard the damage is already done. As we have witnessed countless times, once something it out on the web, the harder you try to suppress it the more attention it attracts. It really boils down to do you think someone will act on the contract, and if so, how bad are the possible consequences.
Arguably, the government is taking away your freedom of speech, in this instance, through its enforcement of contract law.
I mean, how likely are you to be able to refuse to sign this, if your health is at stake?
How likely is it period to expect your physician to put this form under your nose before being willing to help you? It seems somewhat comparable to a EULA in that regard, seeing that there is no way to test the product other than by 'buying' it first. Can that be binding?
the NDA comparison doesn't seem to apply, since you don't generally sign NDAs in life-threatening situations, or situations in which you are perhaps intentionally kept uninformed of the consequences of signing such a thing.
And what happens then? Can your physician refuse to treat you? Can he do so always, only in 'non-life-threatening' cases, or never? It seems very murky, medical ethics-wise.
I'd say the agreement could be that the patient is free to post about the doctor. The patient agrees that doing so allows the physician to post, in public, about the patient. This should help us identify legitimate whistleblowers from Munchhausen whackjob hypochondriacs and whiners.
L.V.X., brother mouse
...doesn't mean it's enforceable, or even legal. Clauses that violate a person's civil rights are never binding, even if accepted willingly.
If it's not an emergency, I won't sign such a form, and if the doc doesn't like it, there's others. If it IS an emergency, I'll sign, write the bad review if I get bad service, and argue about unconscionable terms later.
If the state doctor's association convinces every doctor in the state, or my insurance company convinces all its member doctors, to require such a form, I'll post the bad reviews under a pseudonym. If they're going to collude, I'm going to cheat.
I pay for employer provided healthcare through my hard work, so I'm not getting it for free.
This is a reason I'd like to see government mandated group status for individuals. I was drawn to Obama last summer because one of this thoughts on healthcare was to open up the FEHB (federal employees) group to all Americans. Now, don't get me wrong, the federal full-service plan is expensive - but it is very good, and there are some HDHP options (I think). I am an employer (a small one), and I provide benefits for my employees, but for a while I was on my own. My rates were good (great, really, but I was thirty-something and healthy), but any year I became too expensive for my insurer I could have been dropped. Give people group status with such a large group has benefits primarily for the consumer, but the federal market of 2M+ insured is too big a chunk for most major healthcare companies to write off entirely.
If nobody got healthcare from their employers, and there were competition (as there is in FEHB) on the open market the system would be a bit more flexible. I don't think a single payer system will make healthcare better or more efficient. It's true that, to a certain extent, if you don't pay for top rate healthcare you don't get first rate healthcare. This is straying a bit for from the topic, as the ability to write reveiws or not does not (or should not) affect the rates you pay at the doctor's office, but it does speak to the breadth of choice. With more expensive coverage normally comes greater freedom of choice - which would allow you to vote with your feet. As with just about everything in life, the more you pay the more you can choose your path. I am not at the top of the money pile, so this is a bit of my own dogfood, but as mother used to say, "beggars can't be choosers." *shrug*
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I wouldn't be surprised to find out physician arrogance was a leading cause of malpractice suits.
Well, consider it a contributing factor. It's actually bad blood between patient and physician that is the #1 cause of malpractice suits; sometimes that's rooted in an unreasonable physician, sometimes in an unreasonable patient or family. Also, the specialty makes a huge difference: in a general practice, there's a great deal more handholding required. I'm an anesthesiologist, and I have what I think is a pretty good bedside manner for my specialty. I'd be bad at family practice, but the qualities people seem to respond well to in anesthesiologists are the same things they want in airline pilots: a calm, unexcitable person you'd trust with your life (because you're definitely doing that). It's a good fit for me, but not for everyone.