How did this happen? I'm confused and amused.

[thistlechaser]

The other day, I thought I got a strange spam email. Strange for a number of reasons: Gmail put it into my inbox instead of spam folder. It was well-written. It contained no links to anywhere or anything. It looked like an email I'd get at work (it was written by a senior surgeon or doctor to other doctors).

I googled sentences from it, but got no results (usually if it's spam, something would come up). It was a mailing list from a doctor, telling me (and other people BCCed) that we were now on the mailing list for surgeons and ER doctors at [hospital] (I know exactly which one and where it is, but I'm not going to post it in an unlocked post).

Figuring it was just odd, failed spam, I ignored it. An hour later I got an email talking about insurance issues for incoming ER patients. Then I got one with talk about who would have to work Christmas or New Years (but no one has to work both holidays, so that's nice for them). I got an email about a new hire who would work 12 days per month to cover vacation times. I got a happy email explaining they hired someone who would work only nights, making everyone's hours better.

Just now I got a spreadsheet listing hospital rooms, patient's first and last name, which doctor they're assigned to, and one other column that makes no sense (some kind of hospital or insurance code, I guess).

This is coming to my thistlechaser AT gmail address. I've never been to the state the hospital is in. For my own hospital visit and any other real life issues, I use a gmail address containing my RL name. I never use thistlechaser for anything RL. How in the world did my email address get into their mailing list?

Talk about privacy issues! I know I should contact them and point out that they have me on their mailing list in error, but this is really interesting.

Comments

[bacchuslives.livejournal.com]

Wow... If this happened at my place of work, it would have resulted in swift executions of responsible staff!

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, seriously. Especially with this list of patients...

[tersa.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you really should. They're inadvertantly probably violating a ton of laws by having you on the mailing list.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, true. I'm really curious about how I got on the list though. A really, really close gmail user name to mine and they typoed? Or the list creator copied my email for some other use and pasted it in by mistake? I can't figure it out.

[wizardelfgirl.livejournal.com]

Most probably a typo error on their part. Some doctor out there with a similar email than yours is not receiving all this stuff lol.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I can't imagine a RL name similar to 'thistlechaser', but it's possible! And ha, yes, his boss is going to demand why he never answers his emails...

[mark356.livejournal.com]

Ditto. That's what it sounds like to me.

A couple years ago, I kept getting calls from nurses saying things like "Steve, you need to make another appointment," or "Steve, we have your test results," or "Steve, you need to take your medicine." Every time, I told them that they must have the wrong number, but they kept calling back. I only stopped receiving those calls when I got rid of the phone.

[wizardelfgirl.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know what you mean, for about three years, three! I kept getting calls from a bank looking for this guy who obviously owed them and either gave them a wrong number to keep them from finding him or the bank input his data wrongly. No matter how many times I told them they had the wrong number, every couple of months the calls would start again. At some point they finally understood and stopped calling (since the calls were to my landline phone, I didn't have the option of getting rid of it).

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Wow, that would be so annoying!

[kelen.livejournal.com]

Not sure you want to get involved, but I'd try and contact these people. Even if they meant to send it to another doctor.. that shouldn't be happening.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Seriously shouldn't be happening, especially since the doctor's first email to the list said something like "reply or I'm not keeping you on the list". I sure as heck did not reply!

[manue7a.livejournal.com]

Out of control. The interwebs.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Seriously!

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I could resist the urge to look at them either.
I'm sure at some point the person who should be getting these emails will say "why haven't you sent me those emails?" and it will be found.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I looked at this morning's report of patients admitted overnight. I'm surprised how common Cellulitis (what I had in December, bad skin infection) is! Three new cases were admitted since yesterday. It's so interesting to see a POV I'd usually never get to see.

[teaandfailure.livejournal.com]

Someone may have unknowingly used your address only with a dot in it. This happened to me; my gmail is threebees, and someone got three.bees, because someone else advised them that gmail would recognize this as a different address.

It totally does not! So I was getting like, her invoices for online purchases and stuff. Luckily one of them had her phone number on it, so I called her and let her know it was happening.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

That was good of you to call her!

Google treating name, n.ame, na.me, etc as all the same name is handy sometimes. Want two accounts on a site, but that site wants a unique email address per account? There you go!