Plaintiffs Dismiss Suit vs. CareDash Without Prejudice After Website Shutdown

to U.S. District Court for Western Missouri in Kansas City. The class action claimed NuFit Media, which operated the CareDash medical profile website, "misappropriated" information and profiles of two Kansas City-area counselors to drive traffic to its website, which ceased operation Feb. 1. CareDash used publicly available data associated with the national provider identifier registry to push traffic to sponsored featured listings on its website under a “pay-per-click” advertising model under which CareDash received a commission. The plaintiffs claimed invasion of privacy for CareDash’s “appropriation” of their names and likenesses and alleged right of publicity from the company’s “use of information in the public domain” to operate the site, which provided information and profiles of healthcare providers and allowed consumers to write reviews. The American Psychological Association hailed the shuttering of CareDash in a Feb. 3 blog post, calling it a “major victory in protecting psychologists’ reputations and livelihood.” An APA companion organization demanded in an Aug. 4 cease-and-desist letter that CareDash “immediately stop listing psychologists’ names on the CareDash platform without their permission,” it said. The APA said CareDash was encouraging prospective patients to obtain online scheduling through unauthorized profiles of practitioners and that patients were instead redirected to online therapy platforms or other networks of competing providers. APA’s advocacy arm is working with Sens. Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M; Steve Daines, R-Mont.; and Tina Smith, D-Minn., on medical “ghost networks” that “sow confusion and frustration among patients.”