Bad On-line Reviews: Dr. Hart, a cardiologist, has recently received some negative on-line reviews on the...

Bad On-line Reviews: Dr. Hart, a cardiologist, has recently received some negative on-line reviews on the review site “RATE your DR”. One review stated: “Dr. Hart is rude, incompetent and suffers from the god complex. I would NOT recommend him! – Sally” Another review read: “Dr. Hart missed diagnosing my husband’s serious heart condition. He is incompetent—and has the personality of a paper cup! – Susie” Both reviewers gave him 1 out of 5 stars. Dr. Hart is embarrassed and mad about these reviews (and a few others). He thinks they are made up reviews and false. When Dr. Hart googles his name, that is one of the first things that come up! Dr. Hart’s business manager suggests that they just get their 20 employees to write positive reviews about Dr. Hart to balance things out (even though these employees have never been Dr. Hart’s patients). They also think about writing anonymous bad reviews about the other cardiologist in town (a competitor). Dr. Hart wants to find out who wrote the reviews and sue the reviewers for defamation. Dr. Hart and his business manager come to you, an attorney, for advice. What do you tell them?

What is the ethical response here?

Business response? What should they do? Should they have employees write good review for Dr. Hart? Explain. Should they write fake bad reviews about the other cardiologist? Explain.

Legal response? (Can they even identify the reviewers?) Do they have a claim for defamation against the reviewers? (See p. 134-35) What are the elements? Any defenses that might apply? Explain.

Solutions

Expert Solution

Ethical response:

Dr Hart should not write any bad reviews about other doctors. Also the staffs of Dr Hart should not write positive false reviews about him.

Business response:

In order to market the services of Dr Hart all possible efforts should be made including writing very encouraging and positive reviews about Dr Hart on internet. The positive reviews should far outweigh the negative reviews written about Dr Hart. However, though positive reviews about Dr Hart should be written but these should not be written by the staffs of the doctor rather the services of internet expert shall be sued for the same.

No fake reviews about other cardiologist should be written by Dr Hart.

Dr Hart can take legal actions against those who have written negative reviews about the cardiologist services provide by Dr Hart by filing defamation case. Yes, they do have defamation case against the reviewers provided the reviews are not the patients of the doctor and have written false review to malign the reputation of the Dr Hart.

In case the reviewers are actually patients of the doctor then the reviewer can say that the cardiologist treatments received from Dr Hart were not good and the patients have not get proper satisfaction from the treatment of the doctor. This is the defence of the reviewer.

ekkarill92 answered 1 year ago

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