Hi everyone,
I've been on the Medical Jusice website, where Drs are protected by gag orders, and I've found these Dr.s protected by gag orders- Dr. Anil Shah, Dr. Paul Nassif, Dr. Ronald Gruber, Dr Sam Rizk. Not on the list- Dr Dean Toriumi, Dr Jay Calvert, Dr. Norman Pastorek, Dr Bahman Guyuron, Dr Frederick Menick. This research is time consuming because you have to type in each name indivually to find out. Thats all I have time for now. I personally, would not consider anyone who feels they need the protection of this dubious service.

So, what does gag list really mean? You can't publicly talk about your bad experiences? Sam Rizk seemed really good on this message board but if this is the case....I am wandering how many unhappy patients can't we really hear from ....because they signed this contract???? Too bad...it's so hard to get a real picture of these surgeons...it all seems like such a money making business....Who suffers? Us....the potential patients...Disguisting...

I personally would not schedule surgery with a doctor that asks me to sign a gag order. If a doctor has to do that, then it tells you that he/she has had enough unhappy patients that they fear patients speaking out and/or have had a number of unhappy patients speaking out and it is effecting their practice and they want to shut up any future ones. Very scary, yet it lets us know who has had a lot of f ups.

I was quite disappointed to see that Dr. Rizk is a part of the group of doctors who insist that their patients sign "gag order" contracts.

But when I went to the Medical Justice website I saw the following information:

http://www.medicaljustice.com/internet- ... cians.aspx
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"Not a "gag": Patients remain entirely free to communicate about their treatment with friends, family, other health professionals, hospitals, licensing boards, attorneys, civil court, and more. There are multiple venues for communicating and/or venting, and these venues are more effective in addressing issue accountability. The Agreement provides additional privacy protections to the patient. Online posts are not forbidden.

Commentary is even promoted; particularly on sites that meet minimum standards for credibility. That's right. This has been a moving target, but the marketplace has responded with meaningful and substantive options. Medical Justice has been instrumental in prompting the marketplace to create these options. Since Spring, 2009, a number of consumer health sites have actively approached Medical Justice asking for guidance on how to work with both doctors and patients. These sites have already implemented or are implementing such standards. Standards include general verification the poster is a patient. Wikipedia followed a similar path. At one point they allowed anonymous posts. Their credibility was questioned. Their policy changed requiring those who post to first register. Now, Wikipedia is perceived as being more credible than before. Doctor rating sites are going through a similar evolution. "
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So in other words, it is not entirely a "gag order" but a contract that somehow stipulates that patients comments should be made on websites on which patient's authenticity can be verified, or websites which monitor the content of negative posts. If you watch the following video you could understand why a doctor might be inclined to protect themselves against anonymous posts on the internet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8T1jO1uEjA

I would venture that since "makemeheal.com" is listed as a referral website on Dr. Rizk's new patient intake form, that this very website is already in compliance with the Medical Justice "gag order" rules. That is to say -- as makemeheal.com members we are already under the "gag order" and always have been.

Absolutely, I would stay away from a doctor who will give me a gag order to sign.

Medicaljustice.com offers services other than internet anti-defamation and not all doctors are opting to use the online-review contracts, as stated below.
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http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2007/08/22/ ... ermission/

"About a third of the 1,600 doctors who pay Medical Justice’s annual fee have asked for the online-review contract since the company started offering it earlier this year, Segal said."

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So it would seem that simply being a member of medicaljustice.com is not enough information to determine whether or not a doctor uses those forms. Granted the above article was written in 2007 so the use of those forms may be more widespread now...

Every time i type a surgeon's name in medicaljustice.com, I get an error page.
It would be nice to see a more complete list of the surgeons who are discussed on this board to know who and who are not using gag order contracts.

Hi,

There is some 'cross pollination' about this topic on my board too which links to this particular thread.

In terms of membership with Medical Justice, what you would be looking for are doctors who are members AND ALSO heavy on the self promotion front. Like which doctors manage to get their name dropped in print media, have a big internet presence in terms of blogs, You Tube videos, TV appearances etc and are also members of MJ.

Why would you look for BOTH those things?
Because if a doctor is very 'heavy' on the self promotion front, the 'litmus test' needed if you then wanted to entertain patient feedback (happy vs unhappy) would be to see if he/she were in the clear for both types of feedback to be made. So, to get some sense of that, you check to see if they are ALSO a member of MJ.

Now, that alone won't tell you if they also require patients to sign a 'gag order'. But it's enough information for you to ask the doctor (during your first consult with him/her) IF such a contract would be required and to also require that the doctor show it to you before you book any surgery with them or put a deposit down for it.

MissJ521@aol.com wrote:
There is some 'cross pollination' about this topic on my board too which links to this particular thread.

MissJ521@aol.com can you please post a link so we can read about what is being discussed on the other board ? thanks

it's pretty similar to what's being discussed here.

Fraud Alert

http://www.ratemds.com/social/?q=node/49926

rhinodoc wrote:

.....when I went to the Medical Justice website I saw the following information:

http://www.medicaljustice.com/internet- ... cians.aspx
__
"Not a "gag": Patients remain entirely free to communicate about their treatment with friends, family, other health professionals, hospitals, licensing boards, attorneys, civil court, and more. There are multiple venues for communicating and/or venting, and these venues are more effective in addressing issue accountability. The Agreement provides additional privacy protections to the patient. Online posts are not forbidden.

Commentary is even promoted; particularly on sites that meet minimum standards for credibility. That's right. This has been a moving target, but the marketplace has responded with meaningful and substantive options. Medical Justice has been instrumental in prompting the marketplace to create these options. Since Spring, 2009, a number of consumer health sites have actively approached Medical Justice asking for guidance on how to work with both doctors and patients. These sites have already implemented or are implementing such standards. Standards include general verification the poster is a patient. Wikipedia followed a similar path. At one point they allowed anonymous posts. Their credibility was questioned. Their policy changed requiring those who post to first register. Now, Wikipedia is perceived as being more credible than before. Doctor rating sites are going through a similar evolution. "
______

So in other words, it is not entirely a "gag order" but a contract that somehow stipulates that patients comments should be made on websites on which patient's authenticity can be verified, or websites which monitor the content of negative posts. If you watch the following video you could understand why a doctor might be inclined to protect themselves against anonymous posts on the internet.

......

Well, ya. "Commentary is promoted", especially commentary that is promotional for the doctor LOL. Read between the lines. MJ members happen to also have a lot of commentary from their 'happy' patients. So, ya--"commentary is promoted". The 'special contract' (the one they don't like being called a 'gag order') does not attempt to preclude a happy patient from making testimonials for the doctor.

Thing is the main reason to verify the patient commentary is so the doc knows which patient to single out when the commentary is from an unhappy patient. The "verification" is used to find the unhappy patient. . It's not as if after they ascertain it's a real patient of theirs who is unhappy they give an 'OK--we know you are a real patient so do carry on with your complaints'. Instead, the patient can get a legal letter claiming his/her comments are 'defamation' or violate the contract in some way. So, behind the scenes, these guys go about scaring the patients so they shut up. Happy patient testimonials never get that kind of letter from MJ lawyers. No attempt to shut those ones up. LOL. Nor do they go about insuring that the happy patient testimonial is a real patient. Some of these MJ members can hire mercenaries to pose as happy patients or have staff or family members doing same.

As to "reputation", you know some of these guys CONSTRUCT one by media marketing campaigns and use MJ to protect that kind of construct. It's not as if MJ asks them: 'Is this a reputation you really earned the hard way or is this some miracle of marketing we'd be protecting here?'

I too would stay away.

And regardless if I had a bad out come and felt that there was a need to express my freedom of speech there is NOTHING that would stop me from telling MY story, MY opinions and sharing MY experience with others.

Sue me.

MissJ521@aol.com wrote:Thing is the main reason to verify the patient commentary is so the doc knows which patient to single out when the commentary is from an unhappy patient. The "verification" is used to find the unhappy patient. . It's not as if after they ascertain it's a real patient of theirs who is unhappy they give an 'OK--we know you are a real patient so do carry on with your complaints'. Instead, the patient can get a legal letter claiming his/her comments are 'defamation' or violate the contract in some way. So, behind the scenes, these guys go about scaring the patients so they shut up.

And what happens from there if you do not want to shut up? It is my understanding at that point a court visit would be involved with a neutral expert witness being called in to verify the patients claims. If there really is a legitimate problem wouldn't this type of attention be a welcome event for the patient? Or is the expert witness on the medical justice payroll too?

To me, it all seems to boil down to this .. don't post negative things on the internet unless you're willing to go before a judge and an expert witness. And that really does seem fair enough. After all, if there really is a problem and if the expert witness verifies your claims - that would seem to open up a whole can of worms for the doctor, and that obviously falls in the patients favor.

However, and this is a big however, if the expert witnesses are being paid off to "not see" real problems then this whole thing is indeed a sham. I think in order to proceed with this line of discussion we would need to see whats happening in actual practice with one of these cases.

A valuable statistic to have would be - out of all such cases that went to court before a judge and expert witness, how many were dismissed on grounds that the expert witness did not see a problem?

Medical Justice began in 2007 so perhaps by now there exists some data like this. I wonder if someone on this board or another board is in a position to try to collect such data?

I think it's really important to get to the bottom of this, because in my opinion it's almost inevitable that over time most doctors will enlist the help of medical justice or a similar service. Either that, or the quality of doctors will gradually erode.

After all, what would-be plastic surgeon wants to spend half a million dollars on medical school and 12 years studying only to have their reputation hang on the whim of an anonymous negative internet posting that may or may not be rooted in the truth? Common sense would dictate that the field of plastic surgery would stop drawing the most intelligent candidates.

I had surgery, the surgeon also happening to be a heavily marketed surgeon in the US of A, and in my opinion there was something not fitting throughout the process of consult and surgery, etc... When I started gathering info and asking around on forums and sharing...my x surgeon's lawyer contacted me and mentioned that I assigned all my intellectual rights or what ever he calls them to the surgeon and they scared me to hell that I could nt breathe well that night...I cried and my heart was beating fast, I imagined myself dying that night!!! The surgery results are not at all at heart and most friends tell me that before was better plus I lost a large sum of money on surgery. I am not coming from a country dominated by laws but we are controlled by our religion, and I never do anything wrong to others but this is against my values not to comment and share and warn others and I do not defame people- but his lawyer also accused me of both defamation and of intellectual property in the sss!!! In my opinion there was something unprofessional about thye surgeon and I feel that this is a result of it... I PERSIST to say that I had to sign under UNDUE INFLUENCE . In my opinion I felt that every time I sent them emails to express my feelings I felt that they did nt answer me and I felt that they started answering me when the case aggrevated and I felt they started answering me when they realized that I am not the type of closing my mouth. What shall I do NOW stay with this and not informing others about my experience or what???? In my opinion, they tried to bully me and in my opinion I felt to their game until I realized with whom I am dealing with!!! I am very unhappy with what happened and with the results and the way I was treated which in my opinion it was not good. I would not reccommend anyone to have surgery with one of the doctors who give papers to sign-I dont feel it s right! I am crying I have his comments printed on paper and signed by his lawyer, I also have evidence to show that my consult process and my experience is somewhat not in place in my opinion! I dont mind your PMs