VERIFY: Is a Mayo Clinic doctor misdiagnosing pregnancies if the woman's a Trump supporter?

QUESTION:

Is a Mayo Clinic doctor misdiagnosing pregnancies as ectopic if the woman's a Trump supporter?

ANSWER:

No, it's a hoax.

SOURCES:

Lee Aase- Director for Social Media at Mayo Clinic

Mayo Clinic Tweet

Twitter parody rules

PROCESS:

A terrible hoax is traveling across Twitter leading some to believe, doctors are misdiagnosing patients, whose politics contradict their own.

The hoax first began in late June by a Twitter User named "Authorized Personnel @drnifkin."

According to a Mayo Clinic spokesperson, they reported the account to Twitter and after a week, the account was suspended.

"This person has no connection to Mayo Clinic, it's an internet troll," Lee Aase, Director for Social Media at Mayo Clinic, said.

Still, social influencers bought into it.

Per Twitter rules, users are allowed to create "parody" or "fan accounts," however the bio must clearly indicate that the user is not affiliated with the subject of the account, i.e. incorporating "parody," "fake," "fan," or "comedy" into the bio and account name.

@drnifkin was later unlocked after he changed his bio to read, "obstetrician at the world renowned Mayo Clinic parody."

By then, too many people had saved a screenshot and were rehashing the hoax.

"That's how it's resurfaced again, one of those screenshots Milo Yiannopouloss posted on his Facebook and that led to a new outcry, Aase said.

That's when Mayo Clinic responded with their own tweet.

"Because we have about two million followers on Twitter, we didn't want to spread the word further by out engagement with it," Aase said. "There were so many comments that you can't respond to them all."

Right now, Aase has referred the social scare to Mayo Clinic's legal department to explore their options.

"Parody is one of those terms, they seem to think its a get out of jail free card and we jst say instead, it's a fraud, it's a hoax and it's inflammatory," he said. "That's just something that would not be tolerated at Mayo Clinic and we're frankly disgusted that someone would trade on that good name as a way of riling people up for political purposes."