A doctor recently claimed on social media that UnitedHealth called her mid-surgery, denied her patient an overnight stay, and threatened legal action for her online posts about the incident after the company retained the defamation law firm Clare Locke.
On Jan. 7, a plastic surgeon named Elisabeth Potter
posted a video of herself on Instagram claiming that UnitedHealthcare called her mid-surgery and asked her to justify an in-patient stay for a woman who has breast cancer and needed a surgical procedure to treat it. Potter then claimed that the insurer denied the patient an overnight stay and threatened her with legal action for her posts.
She included what appeared to be screen grabs of the letter from Clare Locke, dated Jan. 13. “We are writing to demand you correct your knowingly false, misleading, and defamatory posts regarding UnitedHealthcare,” it reads. The lawyers claim she made an error and that is why the insurer reached out, and that it would never have asked or expected her to step out mid-surgery. Clare Locke asked that she post a public apology and retract her accusations.
“I am a woman taking care of women affected by breast cancer,” Potter wrote on X. “I do this work with all of my heart, and I will continue to speak up for my patients—because they deserve better.