Who uses RealSelf
Healthcare providers who meet RealSelf's listing criteria can have a profile; participation is tied to board certification, specialty, licensing and training (for example, board-certified surgeons for surgical procedures, and MDs, DOs, nurse practitioners, registered nurses and physician assistants for non-surgical medical aesthetics). Practices can have a business page once at least one associated doctor is on the site. Reviewers are community members who describe their own treatment experience.
Claim your profile
- Check that you meet RealSelf's Healthcare Professional Listing Criteria; RealSelf also confirms that a doctor's medical license is valid and in good standing before the doctor appears on the site.
- Claim your doctor profile (RealSelf describes claiming as free; paid upgrades are optional).
- For a practice page, at least one doctor associated with the practice must already be on RealSelf, so doctors who are not listed should claim their own profile first.
- Allow up to four business days for a new profile or practice page to appear.
Replying to reviews
The RealSelf help pages reviewed for this guide do not describe a public reply feature for providers on reviews, so check your provider account or RealSelf support for current options.
- RealSelf says it does not remove a review because a provider asks or because the review is negative, as long as it meets the Terms of Service.
Review rules
In our own words. The official page is the rule that applies.
- RealSelf says it publishes positive and negative reviews alike when they follow its Terms of Service.
- Reviews are typically declined for excessive cursing or name-calling, hearsay about someone else's experience, illegal content such as threats or cyber-bullying, or an author who is an employee, family member or friend of the practice.
- Reviews written in exchange for an incentive from a practice are declined, and providers may not pay for reviews or write their own.
- RealSelf removes a review only if the reviewer asks or the review breaks its Terms of Service.
- Posts may not contain personal attacks, threats or intimidation, or bullying.
Reporting a review
RealSelf's own process, step by step.
- If you believe a review violates the Terms of Service, submit your dispute in writing through RealSelf's Dispute a Review form for healthcare providers, without including confidential patient information.
- If you suspect a review is false or exaggerated, contact RealSelf and its team will investigate.
Tips
- Keep your doctor and practice information accurate and up to date.
- Never pay for, write or incentivize reviews, since RealSelf prohibits this.
- Judge a dispute by whether the review breaks the written rules, not by whether it is negative; RealSelf says it does not settle factual disagreements between doctors and patients.
- RealSelf requires providers to follow HIPAA, so do not confirm that someone is a patient or discuss their care in anything you post.
Sources
Last checked October 22, 2026. Site rules change; the official pages are the final word.
- https://www.realself.com/about/doctors
- https://support.realself.com/hc/en-us/articles/36339478888091-Business-Pages
- https://www.realself.com/professionals/policies
- https://www.realself.com/company/standards
- https://support.realself.com/hc/en-us/articles/36339302296731-When-Does-RealSelf-Remove-Reviews
- https://support.realself.com/hc/en-us/articles/36339369434267
- https://support.realself.com/hc/en-us/articles/36339390811035-What-If-I-Suspect-a-Review-is-Fake
- https://www.realself.com/community-guidelines
- https://www.realself.com/dispute
About the numbers
- AI citations: the share of answers from AI assistants that cite a page on realself.com, out of 23,227 answers in the last 90 days, to questions about the businesses in our directory ("what do customers say about ...") and to category questions ("best dentist in ..."). Search-result and help pages on a review site are not counted. As of October 30, 2026. ↩
- Cited by AI, by industry: for each industry (a directory category, or the national brands filed under an industry such as e-commerce), the share of AI answers about businesses in that industry that cite a page on realself.com; n is the number of answers in that industry (last 90 days; only industries with at least 20 answers). As of October 30, 2026. ↩
- Site reach: the estimated monthly organic search visits to realself.com (DataForSEO Labs) and its Domain Rating (Ahrefs, 0 to 100). These are third-party estimates for the whole domain, not figures from RealSelf. As of October 2026. ↩
How these numbers are collected: how we measure.