In an era where in­for­ma­tion trav­els at the speed of a swipe, physi­cians who write health columns, whether for news­pa­pers, mag­a­zines, or on­line plat­forms, play an in­creas­ing­ly valu­able role. They help in trans­lat­ing com­plex med­ical sci­ence in­to ac­ces­si­ble ad­vice, pro­mote screen­ing and pre­ven­tion (such as do­ing an­nu­al Pap smears!), and hope­ful­ly help read­ers make more in­formed de­ci­sions about their health. The goal is sim­ple and no­ble—ed­u­cate, clar­i­fy, guide.

Yet, this role al­so comes with a less dis­cussed chal­lenge: ex­po­sure to on­line crit­i­cism that can be un­re­lat­ed, per­son­al, and at times deeply deroga­to­ry. It is now com­mon­place for health pro­fes­sion­als to re­ceive on­line com­ments that are un­re­lat­ed to the sub­ject mat­ter they ad­dress and are down­right un­pleas­ant and hos­tile.

The com­ment sec­tions be­neath these ar­ti­cles have now be­come spaces where frus­tra­tion, anger, and per­son­al griev­ances are pro­ject­ed. Some­times these come from dis­sat­is­fied pa­tients, at oth­er times from in­di­vid­u­als who dis­agree with the writer’s stance on cer­tain health top­ics, while some of these re­marks have lit­tle to do with the ar­ti­cle it­self.

There is now a grow­ing body of re­search that doc­u­ments the ex­tent of this prob­lem. One sur­vey found that one in four physi­cians re­ports be­ing per­son­al­ly at­tacked on so­cial me­dia, in­clud­ing through neg­a­tive com­ments and co­or­di­nat­ed ha­rass­ment, in­clud­ing threats and dis­clo­sure of per­son­al in­for­ma­tion. Fe­male and mi­nor­i­ty doc­tors of­ten face dis­pro­por­tion­ate ha­rass­ment on these plat­forms.

And this is far be­yond just a re­spon­si­ble cri­tique of their ideas. For doc­tors who reg­u­lar­ly write or speak pub­licly, this neg­a­tiv­i­ty can be­come a rou­tine, yet un­set­tling, part of their pro­fes­sion­al life.

Ul­ti­mate­ly, on­line com­ments, even the off-top­ic or pet­ty ones, can af­fect per­cep­tion and rep­u­ta­tion and while they may be base­less, can have re­al con­se­quences.

Pub­lic per­cep­tion mat­ters, and stud­ies show that neg­a­tive on­line re­marks, es­pe­cial­ly when vis­i­ble and un­chal­lenged, can in­flu­ence how read­ers per­ceive a doc­tor’s cred­i­bil­i­ty. In health­care, where trust is cen­tral, this is par­tic­u­lar­ly con­cern­ing. Po­ten­tial pa­tients may en­counter these com­ments with­out con­text and form im­pres­sions that are dis­con­nect­ed from a doc­tor’s ac­tu­al qual­i­fi­ca­tions or track record.

At the same time, it is cru­cial to un­der­stand that deroga­to­ry on­line com­ments may say very lit­tle about a doc­tor’s com­pe­tence, skill, or pro­fes­sion­al­ism. Clin­i­cal abil­i­ty is mea­sured by train­ing, ex­pe­ri­ence, out­comes, eth­i­cal prac­tice, and ad­her­ence to ev­i­dence-based med­i­cine—not by anony­mous opin­ions in a com­ment sec­tion.

A good doc­tor is de­fined by sound clin­i­cal judge­ment, com­pas­sion, on­go­ing ed­u­ca­tion, and pa­tient safe­ty. None of these qual­i­ties can be ac­cu­rate­ly as­sessed through an on­line re­mark, par­tic­u­lar­ly one dri­ven by emo­tion or per­son­al dis­sat­is­fac­tion. Con­fus­ing pop­u­lar­i­ty or on­line ap­proval with pro­fes­sion­al com­pe­tence risks un­der­min­ing the very stan­dards that med­i­cine is built up­on.

None of us who use a plat­form to share health in­for­ma­tion are im­mune to this, but pro­fes­sion­al guid­ance ad­vis­es against re­ac­tive en­gage­ment. Knee-jerk replies can es­ca­late con­flict. but us­ing a con­sid­ered, calm re­sponse—or no re­sponse at all—of­ten serves cred­i­bil­i­ty bet­ter.

How­ev­er, one of the most painful con­se­quences of on­line deroga­to­ry com­ments is not just the ef­fect on the doc­tor, but on their chil­dren. In a dig­i­tal age where chil­dren and ado­les­cents are on­line from an ear­ly age, it is in­creas­ing­ly pos­si­ble that they may come across harsh or un­true re­marks writ­ten about a par­ent. Un­like adults, chil­dren of­ten lack the emo­tion­al ma­tu­ri­ty or life ex­pe­ri­ence to con­tex­tu­alise such com­ments. They may take them at face val­ue, feel em­bar­rassed, con­fused, or wor­ried that what they are read­ing re­flects the truth.

Re­search on cy­ber­bul­ly­ing and on­line ha­rass­ment shows that ex­po­sure to neg­a­tive on­line con­tent about a loved one can cause anx­i­ety, dis­tress, and a sense of help­less­ness in chil­dren, even when the com­ments are clear­ly un­fair. It may then be help­ful to ex­plain that the In­ter­net does not al­ways re­flect re­al­i­ty and that not every­one who writes on­line is be­ing fair, truth­ful, or kind.

Im­por­tant­ly, no pro­fes­sion, in­clud­ing med­i­cine, is im­mune from crit­i­cism, and pub­lic roles nat­u­ral­ly at­tract strong opin­ions. Fram­ing the sit­u­a­tion as part of stand­ing up for im­por­tant is­sues—such as health ed­u­ca­tion—can help chil­dren see their par­ent’s work as mean­ing­ful rather than con­tro­ver­sial.

In the end, any­one who pro­vides health ed­u­ca­tion pub­licly is pro­vid­ing a pub­lic ser­vice by shar­ing knowl­edge and en­cour­ag­ing health­i­er lives. While on­line deroga­to­ry com­ments can be dis­cour­ag­ing and dam­ag­ing if left unchecked, they are poor in­di­ca­tors of a doc­tor’s true com­pe­tence or val­ue.

Ul­ti­mate­ly, clin­i­cal skill, eth­i­cal prac­tice, and pa­tient care—not anony­mous opin­ions—re­main the true mea­sures of what makes a good doc­tor.