Slashdot Mirror
Doctors To Patients: First, Do No Yelp Harm
theodp writes "When he walked into the dentist's office, Ars Technica's Timothy B. Lee was looking for cleaner teeth, but was shown the door after expressing outrage at being asked to first sign a 'mutual privacy agreement' calling for him to transfer ownership of any public commentary he might write in the future about his experience to the good doctor. Lee reports that similar censorious copyright agreements are popping up in doctors' offices across the country. 'Doctors and dentists are understandably worried about damage to their reputations from negative reviews,' writes Lee, but 'censoring patients is the wrong way for doctors to deal with online criticism.'"
If I get bad enough service anywhere, I will post a review somewhere. Mostly products and restaurants, but I've done it for a doctor that gave me an appointment 3 months out and then was hours late.
I almost never do this with my real name. It can be my pseudonymous yelp, google, etc. account. No doctor would be able to know that some nick is my real name. Unless they want to get a subpoena for every negative review (actually I can see some asshole doctors doing this) there is no way to enforce this policy.
Man, you really need that seminar!
The office complained that the main reason to ask people to sign these was that non-patients were fraudulently posting lies and negative information on message boards. When Timothy asked how this NDA would even apply to non-patients, they shut up and couldn't answer him.
I was under the impression that a contract cannot take away rights guaranteed by the constitution. Am I wrong?
"Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right" - Salvor Hardin
More than the Streisand Effect there. Not only does this make you look awful to POTENTIAL customers, it makes you look even worse to EXISTING customers, who you're asking to sign the form. If you walked into a restaurant and were met at the door by an employee asking you to sign a waiver indemnifying them in case of food poisoning, would you stay and eat, or run like hell (and NEVER come back)?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
While I have no doubt that proper chiropractic technique is safe and effective, there is always the possibility that the chiropractor didn't use proper technique or doesn't use the correct technique for the problem. That and I can say from personal experience that different chiropractors have different techniques and some are better then others. My last chiropractor was actually a husband/wife team and even though they tried to use the same technique, there was clear differences between the two of them. While they were OK (neither harmed me) I honestly have a hard time recommending them because I didn't get the same results as the guy I had used prior who unfortunately moved out of state.
My current chiropractor is much better and is far more open to listening to me and working with me and my life style to improve my health. Frankly he listens to me while my old one wanted to tell me how to live (specifically stop racing motorcycles).
Another reason I would give a negative review of my old chiropractor is that while he correctly had me get a MRI for my lower back, he then dismissed the analysis by the neurologist THAT HE RECOMMENDED and then made no changes in adjusting me. After I changed chiropractors, I had a new analysis done by a different neurologist (recommended by my current chiropractor) and the result is he changed how he adjusts me and the results have been fantastic.
Long story short, it's more then about someone causing your physical harm, but rather adjustment table side manner and technique which works for the patient.
Lastly, I'm really tired of the "us vs. them" mentality that chiropractors tend to have with the medical community. I'm not paying you so I can listen to how poorly you're treated by evil Big Pharma or people with Ph.D.'s. Bad mouthing others is a poor way of building a positive and long term relationship with a client.
You mean like the supposedly unconscionable forced arbitration clauses? The ones that the Supreme Court just ruled are valid?
When everyone requires that you sign all your rights away as a matter of course, what rights do we have left? To to live in the woods somewhere and never interact with another human being.
Then they're welcome to put it in their contract, as long as the contract can be enforced by them and not by the government.
I would be curious if the threat of withholding health services could be considered duress.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Original post was saying the average person has no right to criticize, as the average person is a "faux connoisseur." I was responding to this elitist post, a post that was engaging in class warfare by claiming the average person has no right to complain, as they are all just whiny egotistical complainers who are too stupid to critique the goods and services they receive.
Bullshit. This is just another elitist moaning that his sheep-like customers aren't being as sheep-like as they are supposed to be. How DARE they get together and compare notes? How is he supposed to take advantage of them, as is his right as an elite, if they actually talk to each other? There aught to be a law!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
IANAL, but...
Two good examples: real estate transfers and copyright transfers, both of which require specific written language.
The dentist's contract is inconsistent with the copyright law's requirements for copyright transfer (and hence is null and void, as a matter of law).
It is extortion for the doctor or dentist to use his position of authority so to attempt to coerce the patient in a manner contrary to law.
"My opinions are my own, and I've got *lots* of them!"