In the last 3 months I’ve had an odd uptick in calls for foot-drop. Some of them said they’d seen other neurologists and were hoping I could help them, others that they wanted to see a specialist in foot-drop. Most called in, a few even showed up at the office wanting to be seen that day.
Now, I have nothing against seeing patients with foot-drop. It’s a relatively common issue in my field. But I’ve never claimed to be a “specialist” in foot-drop. I don’t even do my own EMG/NCVs anymore, except for the occasional carpal tunnel syndrome case.
Dr. Allan M. Block
So where were all these people coming from?
All of them had previously seen good neurologists, had the correct work-up, diagnoses, and treatment, but just hadn’t had the outcome they wanted. Now they were showing up at my little office, telling my staff that I was their last hope.
All of them had the common thread that they weren’t sent by my regular referral base. Instead, they found me on “the Internet.” Of course, none remembered where. This isn’t easy, as there are hundreds of physician listing and review sites out there. But, because of the number of calls, and the abuse that my staff and I were getting when people found out I wasn’t some magical foot-drop guru, I decided to try to find out.
After a few days of searching in my spare time, I finally had it. A site called MediFind lists me as being “advanced” in treating foot-drop, to the extent that it’s at the top of my “Areas of Expertise.” The site also says I handle “Autosomal Dominant Partial Epilepsy with Auditory Features” (no, I don’t. Try the epilepsy centers in town), “Familial Neurocardiogenic Syncope” (no), and narcolepsy (definitely not, try a sleep specialist).
I have no affiliation with MediFind. In fact, I’d never heard of them until I began tracking down this issue. How they came to have such incorrect information about me I don’t know, perhaps pulled from insurance billing data, or patient reviews, or a Magic 8 Ball.
But the foot-drop issue had, oddly, become a problem. My staff was having to tell people who called in with it that I wanted to see their previous neurology records so I didn’t waste their time. People being told I wasn’t some Ivory Tower foot-dropologist often became abusive and nasty, something I won’t tolerate (5 years ago this was rarely a problem, now it’s frighteningly common). People who made it as far as seeing me (a few when this began) were livid when I looked through their records and said I had nothing to offer that their previous neurologist(s) hadn’t done. I was accused of false advertising, misrepresenting myself, etc, even though I had nothing to do with why MediFind put that up.
So I wrote to MediFind, using the email info on their page. I told them I didn’t specialize in foot-drop, and didn’t even handle several of the other conditions on their page. I asked them to take those things out, or (preferably) simply delete my listing from their site.
I got an automated reply thanking me for writing to them and saying their team would look into it. That was almost a month ago. I haven’t heard back, and the listing is, as of this writing, still up.
The computer algorithms that create such listings have no interest in correcting their errors, and so the frustration for these patients, my staff, and myself, is going to continue for a while. It’s a waste of time for them and us.
And, as this point, I doubt there’s much I can do about it.
Dr. Block has a solo neurology practice in Scottsdale, Ariz.