Doctor complaining about patient on Facebook...

[Jess137]

https://www.dailydot.com/society/ob-gyn-doctor-patients-facebook-confidential/

Yes this is a real story. Thoughts?

 

[robinator]

I'm a mixed bag on this one - doctors are people too and need to vent also. I'd say there is a 100% chance that this patient is not one of her FB friends would never have found out about this had it not made the news. The patient remained unidentified but now that this is made public it would not be hard for the given patient to deduce it was about her.

But from a professional stance, the doctor should not have said anything. It's like a teacher bitching about a student on FB, imo - some things should not be made public.

I honestly hope the doctor is not fired over this, assuming it was a one-off and she has learned her lesson.

 

[Jess137]

I'm a mixed bag on this one - doctors are people too and need to vent also. I'd say there is a 100% chance that this patient is not one of her FB friends would never have found out about this had it not made the news. The patient remained unidentified but now that this is made public it would not be hard for the given patient to deduce it was about her.

But from a professional stance, the doctor should not have said anything. It's like a teacher bitching about a student on FB, imo - some things should not be made public.

I honestly hope the doctor is not fired over this, assuming it was a one-off and she has learned her lesson.

Exactly my thoughts! I work in a doctors office so I see it from that side and I can see the other side, I don't think she should lose her job. I'm sure she'll be disciplined, besides the fact that she will most likely lose plenty of patients over this. I'm just curious what people think who are not in that field or something similar.

 

[staralfur]

I don't think it's a really big deal, to be honest. But then again being late is like my #1 pet peeve and so I have little to no sympathy for people who are NEVER on time...

I think the mention of the stillborn made it a little too personal, actually. But the initial post...eh, whatever.

 

[Pearls18]

This is so difficult because social networking is still a relatively new thing. There have been quite a few reports in the British media of people undergoing disciplinary action and being fired for things they have said about their employers and so forth on Facebook. I think it is really important to remember the internet is still public, if you wouldn't shout out at party in front of hundreds "I hate my boss" don't do it on facebook. I am very mindful of what I write on facebook, I never write anything about our visitors even if it is broadly speaking because at the end of the day it is unprofessional and reflects badly on me AND my employer. In the case mentioned in this thread I think because the name wasn't mentioned she shouldn't be sacked, however, the mere fact it has gone viral means the patient will quite likely figure out it was her she was talking about and thus be hurt by the comments, so disciplinary action needs to be taken. The fact she is a doctor is irrelevant, of course she's a person too, but she was being unprofessional, this wouldn't be acceptable if she was a taxi driver, teacher, shop assistant etc. People need to tread very carefully about discussing work on social netowrking sites because employers are starting to become aware of the impact it can have on their reputation and also sensitive information being revealed so I think we will start to see a lot more rules about what people can post about their jobs online written into their contracts etc, thus there being more grounds for disciplinary action.

 

[Andypanda6570]

IMO I feel it is wrong. I know she is a person and needs to vent, but she is also a doctor and should not be posting things like that. She is not being professional either and if she was my OBGYN she wouldn't be after I read that. She should talk to the patient and let it be known it is not ok what she is doing and that her time is valuable. "Maybe I show up late to the delivery" Sorry saying that is not right.. Again JMO

 

[smokey]

I think the real moral of the story is be carfull who you have on your friendslist because even if its all set to private some git is going to take a screenshot and grass you up

 

[overcomer79]

I have a friend who is a school teacher and one day she was sitting in the line for the bank ATM and she saw in front of her toddlers jumping around a van like a bunch of monkeys. She made a facebook status about it (i didn't see the status) but the next day I saw the one where she was thanking her coworker for turning her status over to the superintendent and causing a lot of problems. You really do have to be careful what you post. I never post about my job. Ever.

 

[Lina]

I was 5 hours late for my induction because I was genuinely terrified. (in hindsight, I had very good reasons to be) I'm usually very punctual and arrive early and am left waiting up to an hour sometimes and have never been seen on time. So this annoyance goes both ways. This woman is highly unprofessional and it makes me wonder why this particular patient was late, there could have been genuine reasons every time or it may even have something to do with her approach given her rant.

 

[Eternal]

We all like to vent and complain about our job, customers, clients, students, and this car patients, and she didn't really breech confidentiality although enough details were provided that it nearly does and wouldn't be difficult to find out who the patient was.

I don't see it as a big deal but I do think it was wrong. If it were just, complaining about a patient being late and not saying should be be late for the birth, and then didn't add the still birth, I doubt anyone would have said anything. But it does share too much.

Plus there is a difference between having a moan with colleagues and the general population.

I guess it's down to the fact that some people who use social networks over share.

 

[overcomer79]

I do think it is very wrong. I work at a university and while I have some interesting students, I would never put my rants on facebook about them. I don't care if no one will figure it out. It isn't professional and she did give away some information. I think I saw on a thread here that a person was ranting about a patient refusing a c-section and she was told off as it breeched patient confidentiality. How is facebook any different then BNB?

 

[Andypanda6570]

I do think it is very wrong. I work at a university and while I have some interesting students, I would never put my rants on facebook about them. I don't care if no one will figure it out. It isn't professional and she did give away some information. I think I saw on a thread here that a person was ranting about a patient refusing a c-section and she was told off as it breeched patient confidentiality. How is facebook any different then BNB?

Well it is different only if you use your real name as your user name . If I used my real name as a user name then someone who Googled my real name would see BNB as a site and can click it and see my posts. My user name here ( AndyPanda) they would have to know it and know it was me and they would have to to do a search on google for BNB to come up. Nobody knows my user name on BNB or in my real ife, so they can't search it .That is where people make a mistake when joining some use their real name as a user name. When i Google my real name BNB never comes up..

 

[Andypanda6570]

Did you understand that? Cause I don't know if I did

 

[Randianne]

I worked as a paramedic and then a nurse, and unfortunately this is very common.

I have a lot of friends who still work in the medical profession and I see them talking about patients almost daily on Facebook. It's slightly different in that they're in emergency medicine, so there are very few patients that they see more than once. As long as they don't post any identifying information, their supervisors allow it. The reasoning is that their jobs are extremely stressful and they need to vent. I get this to a point, but I think it's unprofessional to do in a public forum. I complained about some patients too, but only to family or coworkers, and even then privacy laws apply.

 

[Scottish mum]

To be honest I've read it and it's not as bad as I thought it would be. Dr is going on about how late this patient is big deal it's not like she is talking about the patients medical history!! She hasn't named her either! If the female can identify the doctor was talking about her well that will teach her for never showing up at appointments lol x

 

[Foogirl]

I think it depends entirely on the policy her workplace has for the use of Facebook. Other than that she is simply a member of public and is free to post what she wishes. We can't be restricting freedom of speech on the basis of someone's profession and she broke no confidentiality rules which are undoubtedly in place in whatever professional body she is registered in. I actually think she makes a great point. It's ironic that had she written apiece in a newspaper about it, as so many doctors do, people would be agreeing with her.

My employer classes it as a disciplinary offence if I use social networking to slag off the company or their clients. I am always amazed at the number of people who are willing to do this, but I do think if a company isn't keeping up with the trends it's their own look out.

 

[Foogirl]

How is facebook any different then BNB?

At BNB it is against the TOS to do it, at FB it isn't

 

[overcomer79]

ok well I still stand by my belief that it is wrong. I have a very stressful job as well but I don't go slagging students on social media. It's just not appropriate. I don't care if they can't be identified. You know someone is always going to make a stink about it. I just suck it up, vent behind closed doors to my friends that I work with and off I go.

 

[Jess137]

It is against company policy btw, but they are reviewing it as she didn't divulge the patient's name, etc. The company has a pretty strict social media policy actually.

 

[steph.]

I dont think its that bad. I agree with pp who said the mention of the stillbirth probably made it a little too personal but you still cant identify the patient. I am a doctor and although i never put anything about my patients on facebook, i do vent to family and friends sometimes. All my colleagues do. We just know not to identify the patient.