Over a year ago a lady befriended me on Facebook, she appeared to be a hard working genuine lady, selling cosmetic surgery abroad, this lady was hugely supportive of my safety in beauty work, and embraced any new concept or campaign that supported safe beauty. Indeed, so impressed was I with her work and positive reviews displayed on a leading website that I left her a congratulating message on her Facebook page which you can see here below (this screen shot that I had totally forgotten about was kindly given to me by the founder of another review website) yesterday during a conversation on Facebook:

Sadly, it transgressed that this company was leaving fake reviews on a website called ‘Treatment Abroad’. A consumer website that many members of the public including myself had great faith in, therefore a lesson learned to all, be careful what you read on review websites, be careful of what you are told in the guise of social media friendships,  and of the people who befriend you, and their motives, a hidden agenda is a deadly destructive weapon,

A public profile such as mine was bound to be used and abused along the lines of my career, and sadly it has been more than once.  Generally, I am a good judge of character, but no one is perfect when it comes to the judgment call, I have fallen prey to this many times, it’s hard to read personality through social media or on-line, how do we determine if someone can really be trusted, how can we believe a person who states their experience with a surgeon or a clinic was good? what do we have to do to get to the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?.

I have asked the person to remove this supportive endorsement as disappointingly it has materialised through her ex-patients that this is not the case. Treatment Abroad have removed her profile from the website and the devastating aftermath of the reality of the surgery provided by this company can be read and seen on line in articles such as this:  http://dailym.ai/126v2ui via @MailOnline. The lady was always kind to me and supportive, I was at a genuine loss as to why the developments that later unfolded regarding the transparency of the reviews did so quite brutally and harshly. She has gracefully agreed which I thank her for, it’s the least she can do to make amends.

These days I am much more careful about how I compliment surgery providers or any medically related business activities, I have the responsibility of making sure that I do not align myself with unsafe practices or professionals. I think carefully now, and choose not to compliment any person or business I have not had first hand experience of myself. As an advocate of patient safety my job is to carefully relate information which I feel is accurate, a tricky task in itself.

The irony is also that this very morning I contacted a solicitor to pursue a legal case for me, the solicitor had come thoroughly  suggested on-line, once again I trusted the judgement only to be informed that he was struck off for a previous money laundering conviction, shocking! here is his e mail attached apologising for his forgetful ‘inconvenience’ relating to his past.

So it’s back to square one, which is the million dollar question, should we rely on the web for garnering accurate information. The answer quite robustly is NO.

So the moral of the story is this, read carefully, think carefully, choose carefully, can you truly trust a review on a website? unless you have physically spoken to a person and investigated a subject to it’s complete and utter depth, can we ever be really sure of what we read on line, on social media?

Some review websites are fantastic they give us a sense of direction when making a choice, but others are simply confusingly influenced by commercial gain from sponsorships, adverts and the people that advertise on them.

I recently apologised to one review website ( a surgeon review website) as I discovered that a rumour circulating within the industry pertaining to a false patient review regarding a high profile cosmetic surgeon was ACTUALLY TRUE, the revelation came from the lady herself that had posted the review, putting an end to all the nasty gossip that had circuited on the web, (and I emphasise the word nasty as the surgeon review site had got a real battering in terms of  ‘that’ reviews authenticity not only from me, but from many people). The review website founder was rightly owed the apology which I was more than happy to give, but more importantly, what saddened me was the lady who had posted the review, had suffered immeasurable physical and emotional distress after her surgery, and that I find hard to read in any given situation.

T.R.U.S.T  isn’t it a difficult word? 5 simple letters yet so complex and intriguing on the world wide web.

Ultimately I learnt the hard way,  I chose to trust a very reputable  review website and was let down together with hundreds of other people, feeling slightly foolish in the process, and disappointed that I had given my faith so easily, but then again we are human and we do place our trust sometimes with eyes wide shut hoping that the leap we take is a safe one.

To be continued…