I wrote a negative Yelp review and it made my life a nightmare

https://nypost.com/2018/05/28/i-wrote-a-negative-yelp-review-and-it-made-my-life-a-nightmare/

by ytNumbers • 8 years ago

467 250 8 years ago

This almost seems like a Slapp lawsuit.

ceejayoz4• 8 years ago

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.

yani3• 8 years ago

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

caiocaiocaio• 8 years ago

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

cableshaft• 8 years ago

Personally I've discovered quite a few restaurants that I enjoyed quite a bit thanks to Yelp. Google reviews are starting to become more common and comparable, but back then the Google reviews were very sparse and usually only people talking about bad experiences, whereas Yelp was more mixed.

ggg9990• 8 years ago

It has for me. It has basically eliminated truly bad restaurant visits for me, and alerted me to some really cool new experiences.

mojowo11• 8 years ago

Yelp remains very helpful to me in many ways. Looking up the restaurants in an area, filtering by various things (are they open? do they take reservations? what's the noise level?), making reservations, etc.

I know Yelp has a shady underbelly, but pretending that it doesn't have anything to offer is just being intellectually dishonest.

o_____________o• 8 years ago

Based on what?

PascLeRasc• 8 years ago

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• 8 years ago

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.

csomar2• 8 years ago

I disagree. Though it is not Yelp, I have seen business develop from customers who would have been out of reach to them if not for the Internet. Particularly in the hospitality business.

optimuspaul• 8 years ago

I think that we tend to only hear the horror stories. I've never really used yelp, but I know many that have and found it useful as at least a barometer of an area. I'm a contrarian so I find I'm happier if I don't know how others feel about things.

snowwrestler• 8 years ago

I have found Yelp to be better than Google Maps at telling me what the options are for grabbing a bite to eat nearby. I hardly ever read the reviews.

Actually, I used to read the Yelp complaints about the ice cream place near me, which had a famously cranky owner. Those often made me laugh; does that count as joy?

rootlocus3• 8 years ago

Those often made me laugh; does that count as joy?

Yes, yes it does!

AdmiralAsshat• 8 years ago

“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.

ceejayoz4• 8 years ago

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.

Fej3• 8 years ago

Perhaps not exactly. But of all the tabloids, the NY Post has to be one of the most reputable.

confiscate2• 8 years ago

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?

fencepost5• 8 years ago

There's no HIPAA breach in the publishing of the article unless the information is being provided by a covered entity or business associate. Most notably, patients can disclose anything they desire about themselves.

snissn• 8 years ago

I'm curious if that is accurate or not. It hangs in a weird way in the article and doesn't indicate where the info was posted.

Andrenid• 8 years ago

Maybe she means all that info was exposed in the court case?

That's exactly the sort of "true but out of context" thing a tabloid like this site would use.

confiscate2• 8 years ago

even if this is not accurate and the woman exaggerated her claims, just look at all the comments in this post. She already got the effect she was looking for.

People freak out the moment they hear privacy violation. They get angry and stop thinking. The comment above from AdmiralAsshat already says "the practice should be shut down". Some comments above say "it's an open and shut case" without even knowing the details of the proceedings.

Can you imagine if as a doctor, you kept your patient's info private, but a patients says you "posted her medical record" even though it was sealed for her court proceedings? Wow

titanomachy2• 8 years ago

Almost certainly the medical details were shared with the court, under seal, rather than posted to (for example) a public internet forum.

At issue here is a disagreement over what services were performed, so it makes perfect sense that the court would require access to these documents.

The reporting is incredibly one-sided here considering that the case is still unresolved. No doubt it will be damaging to the doctor's reputation even if he is cleared of wrongdoing.

jessaustin8• 8 years ago

...which is why he is an idiot, with an idiot lawyer, for poking this hornets' nest. I say that even if we stipulate that his medical performance was exemplary. You don't fight with disgruntled customers. Spend a couple of minutes to see if you can easily satisfy them, and then forget the whole mess. Recover any products they received, give them their money back, and write off the service you performed. Period.

jastanton• 8 years ago

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.

unethical_ban• 8 years ago

That is awful, and they should be punished severely for that.

This reveals a predicament for businesses that have to protect customer privacy. If a restaurant owner thinks a customer is lying, they can call the person out on all kinds of media and say they're a liar. Alamo Drafthouse made a set of videos to play before movies making fun of a customer complaint call, telling her to eff off.

If a doctor believe a patient is lying or doing a detriment to their business, they can't call them back out on social media. Their only remediation, if they think the statements are false, is a lawsuit to have the force of law take lies down.

dm319• 8 years ago

This is why, at least in the UK, there are several pathways to resolve disputes - both in the hospital trust and above it, which is in part to avoid this kind of scenario. If that doesn't resolve it the patient usually approaches a lawyer to seek compensation, and most times this is settled out of court and in private. When patients and family hit social media, the hospital/doctors are not able to publicly talk about the grievances, or can only put out a very limited public statement with permission (like the recent Alfie case).

I had a friend of mine who refused a request by a patient out of the country, while on-call one weekend. I'll leave out the details apart from it involved shipping a large quantity of a very expensive medication to another country - as the hospital did not have this medication available. He had already sent enough of this medication to cover for at least a week (at huge cost to the NHS, as the medication had to be couriered by plane) when a second request was received 2 days later. A huge internet hate-mob appeared on Facebook saying all sorts of things about this doctor by name, to which he had no ability to respond.

I'm for making healthcare more transparent, but I wonder if, as a doctor, we'd be pressurised into pleasing the patient more than treating the patients correctly, with the threat of negative yelp reviews, though that's obviously a risk with any sort of profession and review system.

SOLAR_FIELDS• 8 years ago

Not to discount your point, because it's mostly relevant, but in the Alamo Drafthouse case I don't ever think they reveal the name of the girl who makes the call.

Though I guess if a phone call had protected HIPAA information and you could tell who it was through their voice it might be a violation?

leeter2• 8 years ago

Reviews are protected speech, this has been litigated multiple times and has precedent in the US. If you live in an area with a SLAPP law I would suggest getting an attorney to file a SLAPP motion for you. The onus is then on the plaintiff to prove they aren't suing you to stifle your speech. If they can't then they have to pay full court costs and your attorney's fees as well as a penalty in many jurisdictions.

In this case the subject is in NY state which has an Anti-SLAPP law and she should apply it and HIPAA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...

ballenf3• 8 years ago

That's fine but they don't have to pay until after the case and appeals. Meaning you have to be able to front the litigation costs in order to have a chance at recovering them. There is a non-zero risk of losing.

I would suggest using a pseudonym and VPN for any review written on a potentially litigious business unless you have the funds to litigate. Problem is Yelp is much more likely to mark the review as spam.

wdn• 8 years ago

Protected or not, the defendant still have many out of pocket cost and distress for defending a lawsuit. Lawyers don’t care. They will get pay. The judge usually don’t read the case until the time of the trial but your expenses is up front and no guarantees of outcome.

I was sued and I pro-se to defend myself. Although the plaintiffs know the lawsuit is frivolous but that doesn’t matter. He said if I don’t apologize and I win the case, he will just spend more money appeal the case and make my life miserable. I apologized and he dismissed the case.

It probably caused him some money, but it had caused me a lot of distress and time reading up the laws.

Nadya4• 8 years ago

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...

avn2109• 8 years ago

Twenty grand in legal fees in Manhattan is about four days of attorney time, if you're lucky.

leesalminen• 8 years ago

$20,000 is nothing for litigation these days. Most advise planning for a minimum of $50,000 or $100,000 to fight something out with a judge.

SolarNet• 8 years ago

The quote is taken out of context I think (this is a tabloid) the doctor probably posted the information to the court docket under seal at the request of the judge or at least probably in accordance with the law.

alexbanks• 8 years ago

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?

heisenbit• 8 years ago

Deliberately writing bills for services not performed is fraud. Of course there can be billing mistakes and corner cases where it is not clear what exactly has been performed. Excessive billing that goes beyond what insurance pay can motivate people to fight back...

There are so many things wrong in how the doctor behaved it is mind-boggling and a big red flag. Fighting angry and stupid people in court is best avoided but one does not always have a choice.

conanbatt7• 8 years ago

You've heard only one side so far.

brightball• 8 years ago

My question around reviews in medical is always around how a physician is supposed to be able to respond because of HIPAA? It almost seems unfair to be able to review them since there is very little they can do to refute anything without violating it.

It seems like there should be some special set of rules around medical reviews, in my opinion at least.

ballenf3• 8 years ago

You can explain just that in the response and not much more.

Even if the patient reveals PHI you should avoid confirming or acknowledging it as the "covered entity" under HIPAA. A confirmation of a diagnosis is different than a person discussing symptoms. I would argue that you probably should avoid even acknowledging that the person is a patient or has been seen in the office. The approach will reinforce to others how seriously you take privacy and you can taut your customer service policies, etc.

I wouldn't call this unfair since all providers are in the same situation.

(This isn't legal advice, obviously.)

lazyasciiart2• 8 years ago

Reviews are opinions. Some of them are lies. Some of them are fake. It is almost never a good idea for a business to try a detailed rebuttal to a negative review, no different for doctors.

b_t_s2• 8 years ago

If it's BS, call them on it with something along the lines of "We dispute the veracity of this claim. Further, the alleged conduct is a felony, so if the client genuinely believes their allegations, we encourage them to file a criminal complaint at their local police station." This conveys "client is a nut, we are professionals, and we can prove it" whereas arguing the details of a case with confidential info in a public forum is wildly unprofessional and sometimes illegal.

rokhayakebe• 8 years ago

Detailed anonymous review, no one can sue you.

conanbatt7• 8 years ago

It cant be understated how a bad review on yelp can tear your practice down and put you on the street. Figure a physician sees 16 to 22 patients a day, and if one of them tanks you you can lose everything.

Review wars are real in all retail businesses, its pretty sad.

-----

I cannot imagine a lawyer would condone the HIPAA violation, I wonder if there are exceptions when the patient has made that information public before you (patient said she had x, and you say "We did not diagnose x") or smth.

dawnerd2• 8 years ago

I've been threatened with a lawsuit over a review before. Even though I know I'd be in the right, just the processes of going to court and defending yourself is a huge pain. Not sure why a company would risk trying to sue someone over a review when it would undoubtedly backfire and be really bad pr for them.

Definitely recommend checking out libel insurance. Shouldn't cost much to get and will help protect against companies trying to go after you.

fencepost5• 8 years ago

Revision: "This review removed under threat of a lawsuit."

And to be scrupulously neutral, 3 stars if that's an option.

ikeboy• 8 years ago

I cut the review back to verifiable facts instead of opinion

Opinion is allowed, verifiable facts are allowed. False statements of facts are not.

xapata3• 8 years ago

If you like to write reviews, buy umbrella insurance. It's cheap and covers all sorts of random stuff for millions.

danieltillett2• 8 years ago

You are assuming this is true. I have read through the case records and I am not confident that anything the defendant says is true. If it is false then the defendant will have just increased their loss - judges tend not to look to favourably on running a PR campaign outside of the court process.

CodeSheikh• 8 years ago

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

mattnewton• 8 years ago

Streisand effect all over again[0]

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

teliskr• 8 years ago

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...

rootlocus3• 8 years ago

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

flippyhead• 8 years ago

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

rootlocus3• 8 years ago

Which party do you see as the bully here?

mschuster91• 8 years ago

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...).

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• 8 years ago

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 ;)

jchw• 8 years ago

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.

hycaria3• 8 years ago

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 ?

mynameisvlad4• 8 years ago

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.

hycaria3• 8 years ago

As I said, I don't live in the US but I've heard that there, bills are negociated by insurances afterwards. It's a shame that the patient has an unexpected bill to pay (and I think a good part of trouble/resentment stems from there). Here it seems like they were not warned about it (whereas we are where I live) and that's the only reasonable explanation I could think of. But maybe someone from there can shed light on why the exam the patient agreed upon came back as an unexpected bill, instead of incomprehensible downvotes ?

dfsegoat• 8 years ago

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.

conanbatt7• 8 years ago

Because the dentist will diagnose you first. When someone says they have a headache, you dont know if he needs an MRI that costs thousands of dollars, or aspirin which is cents.

And also, each insurance pays differently for the same service.

You can always go as a patient to an all cash-clinic, which will have fixed pricing, but then you throw away the benefit of your insurance.

tabtab• 8 years ago

Re: Patients are by far the worst kind of customer to deal with.

Sorry, but if your org has no patience for patients (pun intended), then you are in the wrong biz. It comes across as, "Our business would be smooth if not for pesky humans."

hycaria3• 8 years ago

You are obviously overinterpretating what I've written. For many very comprehensible reasons, the patient/caregiver relationship is difficult. Why wouldn't they ease it with reasonable "contract" (prices, procedure you'll go under) both parties agree upon, and why everything in this story seems unexpected is beyond me. Agreeing to an exam and discovering you're due money for it afterwards is annoying. This should be clear from the get-go, otherwise you're exposing yourself to trouble considering you're already working in a tensed environment.

dqv• 8 years ago

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

mcguire2• 8 years ago

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

https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASCaseInfo?parm=...

danieltillett2• 8 years ago

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

velominati• 8 years ago

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

And file a suit against Yelp.

p3llin0r3• 8 years ago

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

jimrandomh• 8 years ago

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.

yani3• 8 years ago

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.

csomar2• 8 years ago

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)

yani3• 8 years ago

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.

mcguire2• 8 years ago

This, I hope, is the list of documents filed in the case. No. 36 records a motion sealing some for containing her confidential information. I can't cut and paste here, but it says that in one of her affidavits, she included private information and in a response the plaintiff also included private information. There are charitable interpretations on either side.

https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivil/FCASeFiledDocsDeta...

megy2• 8 years ago

I find it impossible for a lawyer company to post medical records of someone else publicly

Where do people here think the medical records were posted? On yelp? On the lawyers website? It is so weird people are just thinking that this stuff is posted publicly.

wccrawford• 8 years ago

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• 8 years ago

Didn't Yelp use to coerce businesses too to pay to get their bad reviews "hidden"?

turc1656• 8 years ago

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.

ssijak3• 8 years ago

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?!)

danans3• 8 years ago

am dumbstruck that people are cool with it.

Huge numbers, perhaps a majority, are not cool with it. We've had national elections fueled by the discontent. But at least so far the political configuration of that discontent, not the magnitude of it, has prevented progress on lowering the cost of health care.

DoreenMichele3• 8 years ago

But at least so far the political configuration of that discontent, not the magnitude of it, has prevented progress on lowering the cost of health care.

Health insurance in this country suffers from kind of a legacy situation. It is sort of like how the qwerty keyboard is terribly inefficient, but most people continue to use it.

From what I have read, at some point health insurance was offered as a means to beef up compensation in a way that was tax friendly for employees, thus helping to entice better employees to come work for your company. This became kind of the standard default and typically covered the family, not just the employee.

This was considered a perk in a situation where most people whipped out their check book to pay for medical care because it was relatively reasonably priced. Then health insurance became kind of the default and it adds overhead and complexity. Obomacare was passed as the only politically viable solution and it's a terrible solution.

Health insurance coverage for basic services doesn't really make sense. Insurance only makes sense as a bet to defray unexpected expenses. When you use it cover annual exams and other basics that you know are guaranteed to happen, it essentially creates an unnecessary middleman, pushing prices higher without providing any real benefit for the cost involved.

This is where we are now and most people don't know how to get out of this mess. It doesn't help that Obamacare puts a gun to your head and insists that most people participate in this charade or be fined at tax time, in essence. Ugh.

OscarCunningham2• 8 years ago

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.

liveoneggs3• 8 years ago

sometimes maybe if that patient is lucky and smart enough to know the inside tricks

The discount is not guaranteed.

nambit• 8 years ago

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.

knodi123• 8 years ago

and don't correspond to anything real or to the amount that gets paid.

Aren't designed to correspond to real payments. But like a sumo wrestling match in a kindergarten, sometimes the little guy gets squashed by accident. And you wind up with people getting $20k bills that don't necessarily know how to get out from under them.

It's

ballenf3• 8 years ago

That used to be the case, but in the last two years I have gotten $1k+ bills after insurance that are very real. For relatively common visits to in-network providers.

lightbyte• 8 years ago

That's not true at all. I currently have a ~$450 bill for a test where I breathed in a tube for 10 seconds at a constant rate. That's after my insurance paid 4k for it already.

kevindqc• 8 years ago

Well she said the insurance covered everything but 500. That's still a lot.

Clubber4• 8 years ago

That used to be the case, but what I've experienced lately is the doctors will submit overpriced bill to insurance, insurance says, "oh you haven't hit your annual deductible yet," and passes the massively overpriced bill directly to me, no negotiation, no nothing.

I've gotten so I just ask what the out of pocket cost is to pay cheaper (usually 1/2 price), and they still manage to hose me with extra services.

It's a racket.

b_t_s2• 8 years ago

It's not "if the hospital discovers", it's if the patient is uninsured and makes it clear to the billing department that they're hopelessly broke, then the hospital gets flexible with the charges or even writes them off. Many billing departments have flexibility and expect to write off a fair number of bills rather than send them to collections, but they're hardly pushing discounted bills or automatically giving discounts.

maxxxxx• 8 years ago

"If a hospital discovers that the patient doesn't have insurance they'll be charged the real (more reasonable) prices instead."

Totally not true. Often they'll send a collection agency.

Fej3• 8 years ago

A significant amount of people have been duped into voting against their own interests.

CM30• 8 years ago

Not really. That would imply people value every aspect of a politician/party platform the same, and will give up on various beliefs to fight for other rights and benefits.

The problem is that you've got a two party system where groups that don't share much in common are lumped together and people are voting for the 'least worst' option. There's no reason the social and economic positions of the Democrats/Republicans have to be linked together like they are.

If they weren't, people may vote differently.

mnm17• 8 years ago

Half or almost half of the population here would let you die of curable sickness or disease just to save a couple bucks (for what purpose, I'm not sure, probably to kill more Arabs or line rich people's pockets). When you understand the underlying hate in America, all the things you list above become obvious as to why they exist. But look on the bright side: if you're lucky enough you can be here profiting off of all these sick people's misery instead of being one of them. You just need to be born in the right family at the right time. That's what most Americans hope for: that they were born to the right family at the right time instead of the one they were born into. Because they sure aren't about to change social class after being born...

hackerman123452• 8 years ago

How can you claim to understand them when you're posting their oppositions propaganda instead of their own arguments? That's like starting a conversation by referring to a pro-choicer as a pro-death... even if you have great arguments against the choice of abortion it's not going to lead to a productive conversation.

As a sibling poster to you said, the ridiculous pricing is part of a game between insurers and care providers. Throwing more money at insurers might not be the ideal answer.

Applejinx• 8 years ago

Yes. Evil people can just silence you by suing you, and yes, you cannot afford to defend yourself.

Present company (much of the HN demographic) excepted: a fair number of HN posters are very atypical in terms of their resources for doing things like hiring lawyers.

phonon3• 8 years ago

The price they billed her (after her insurance negotiated its standard discount) was $427.

ssijak3• 8 years ago

For 400$, in my country, I paid (well not me, my job but that is not the point) for private health insurance for a WHOLE YEAR. It covers all the basic stuff, pregnancy costs, some surgery costs, etc..

Aside from that we are all covered by the state and are not billed for anything apart from some medications. Yeah, hospitals are not that great of a place and there is a lot to be improved, but at least you know that even if you are very poor, you will not be left to die (or with some ridiculous bills) if you are very ill.

And before someone asks, why to pay for private if you have state coverage.. It is a job perk, and in any case, you pay for your time. Service is much faster and more convenient for the basic stuff/illnesses.

Broken_Hippo3• 8 years ago

To be fair... that 427 is more than I'll pay for normal doctor's services in an entire year. (Some things have a different category, but I'm still in less than $1k for the year). I'm in Norway, which isn't exactly known for being a low-cost nation.

Now, I understand I pay taxes to cover health care. This isn't really any worse than I was paying in the states in my monthly premiums. The thing is that it creates a wonderful sort of stability in life. I can plan on taxes, I can plan on the out-of-pocket costs for a year. I won't go bankrupt. I no longer feel I'm getting ripped off for something I might have little to no control over.

reaperducer• 8 years ago

Common, 1k$ for a regular exam that costs like 20euros in my country in private clinics?!

I don't know where you get US$1k for a regular exam, but that is wrong.

My doctor, for example, charges a base (list/MSRP/whatever) rate of $120-$180 for a regular exam.

The "negotiated" rate with the insurance company is $80.

The amount I pay, as a patient, is $10.

If you don't have insurance (for a while I didn't), he charges $50.

$1k for a regular exam is fiction.

FireBeyond• 8 years ago

The "negotiated" rate with the insurance company is $80.
The amount I pay, as a patient, is $10.

This is Shkreli math. "Oh, insurance companies pay larger amounts, most people will get this drug for a $10 copay!"

Oh yes, the insurance companies, those philanthropists magicking money out of ... somewhere other than your pocket, be it directly or indirectly.

JumpCrisscross• 8 years ago

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

DenisM• 8 years ago

Person who threatens bad review writers has mostly good reviews? Hardly counterfactual.

hitekker2• 8 years ago

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...

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...

And so forth.

newshorts• 8 years ago

Yang to the yin of doctors being sued by patients.

jhowell• 8 years ago

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?

ktosobcy• 8 years ago

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• 8 years ago

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• 8 years ago

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.

baxtr• 8 years ago

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

duked• 8 years ago

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)

lazyasciiart2• 8 years ago

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!"

dominotw• 8 years ago

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.

pseudolus• 8 years ago

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.

pasbesoin• 8 years ago

$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.

shanecleveland• 8 years ago

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• 8 years ago

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.

zoltaan• 8 years ago

"the doctors bigger concern may be insurance fraud" Less serious but immediate is the bad publicity of the fact that they aggressively sue unsatisfied patients. I may think twice going to such a person instead of other alternatives.

hitekker2• 8 years ago

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.

skj2• 8 years ago

Yelp's customers are the business owners.

4ad3• 8 years ago

Yelp exists only because people trust it.

miranda_rights• 8 years ago

That's a really good point. By displaying the first names & last initials of the reviewers, Yelp is revealing a lot about the reviewers. I personally wouldn't want to have to create a fake account every time I write a 1-star review

pwaai• 8 years ago

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.

Clubber4• 8 years ago

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!

jayess2• 8 years ago

That is definitely the case. BBB is a scam.

Legogris• 8 years ago

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...

pliftkl• 8 years ago

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."

grimgrin• 8 years ago

Hold on, you cut the title short.

It'd end with a comma, then "and they posted my entire medical record, bills, insurance info, home address, etc"

megy2• 8 years ago

Where did they post them though? They didn't post them to Yelp, you can't do that. They didn't post them on their own website. Where would they have posted them?

oliv__• 8 years ago

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.

conanbatt7• 8 years ago

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.

deaddodo2• 8 years ago

It also seems like this is a go-to tactic of hers. If you check here:

https://www.yellowpages.com/user/503859115/reviews

2014 review by one "Michelle L" of New York, NY. Starts with the exact same byline: "Very poor and crooked business practice.". Completely different practice. One with great reviews, for the most part.

jessaustin8• 8 years ago

Wow how did you find that?

OliverJones• 8 years ago

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.

jayess2• 8 years ago

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.

dawnerd2• 8 years ago

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

ndesaulniers• 8 years ago

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?

OnMyPhone2• 8 years ago

"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.

bobthechef• 8 years ago

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.

OnMyPhone2• 8 years ago

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.

himom• 8 years ago

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.

hi41• 8 years ago

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

mullen• 8 years ago

Even if you are right, people can still sue you. Also, she has to put facts in her review since if she puts in lies or opinions, that can be seen as slander or libel. I think that is where she is getting into trouble.

danso6• 8 years ago

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.

tomohawk• 8 years ago

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...

jessaustin8• 8 years ago

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

sunstone• 8 years ago

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

danso6• 8 years ago

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

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

I wrote a negative Yelp review and it made my life a nightmare

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