Privacy, Cookies & GDPR

The data controller is Mrs Julia McCarthy who is the Care Quality Commission’s registered manager at The Ware Centre of Dental Excellence.

This Privacy Notice is available on the practice www.wcode.co.uk / at reception / by email if you contact info@wcode.co.uk or by calling 01920460190.

You will be asked to provide personal information when joining the practice. The purpose of us processing this data is to provide optimum health care to you.

The categories of data we process are:

• Personal data for the purposes of staff and self-employed team member management
• Personal data for the purposes of direct mail/email/text marketing
• Special category data including health records for the purposes of the delivery of health care
• Special category data including health records and details of criminal record checks for managing employees and contracted team members

We never pass your personal details to a third party unless we have a contract for them to process data on our behalf and will otherwise keep it confidential. If we intend to refer a patient to another practitioner or to secondary care such as a hospital we will gain the individual’s permission before the referral is made and the personal data is shared.

• Personal data is stored in the [EU] whether in digital or hard copy format
• Personal data is stored in the US in digital format when the data storage company is certified with the EU-US Privacy Shield
• Personal data is obtained when a patient joins the practice, when a patient is referred to the practice and when a patient subscribes to an email list

The lawful basis for processing special category data such as patients’ and employees’ health data is:

Processing is necessary for the purposes of preventative or occupational medicine, for assessing the working capacity of the employee, medical diagnosis, the provision of health or social care or treatment or management of health or social care systems and services on the basis of Union or Member State law or a contract with a health professional

The lawful basis of processing personal data such as name, address, email or phone number is:

• Consent of the data subject
• Processing is necessary for the performance of a contract with the data subject or to take steps to enter into a contract

The retention period for special data in patient records is a minimum of 10 years and may be longer for complex records in order to meet our legal requirements. The retention period for staff records is 6 years. The retention periods for other personal data is 2 years after it was last processed. Details of other retention periods are available in the Record Retention (M 215) procedure available from the practice.

You have the following personal data rights:

• The right to be informed
• The right of access
• The right to rectification
• The right to erasure (clinical records must be retained for a certain time period)
• The right to restrict processing
• The right to data portability
• The right to object

If you are a patient of the practice you have the right to withdraw consent for important notifications, newsletters, surveys or marketing. You can inform us to correct errors in your personal details or withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text. You have the right to obtain a free copy of your patient records within one month.

If you are not a patient of the practice you have the right to withdraw consent for processing personal data, to have a free copy of it within one month, to correct errors in it or to ask us to delete it. You can also withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text.

Phone Calls to Ware Centre of Dental Excellence

Your calls may be recorded for quality and training purposes. For more information about call recording legislation in the UK you can visit: http://www.ofcom.org.uk/static/archive/oftel/consumer/advice/faqs/prvfaq3.htm

Use of cookies

As is the case with other websites we use 'cookies' to track usage of the Ware Centre of Dental Excellence website.
Cookies are small text strings websites can send to your browser to help enhance your visit to the website. They cannot pass on computer viruses, retrieve other data from your computer's hard drive or capture your email address. Generally, cookies can be used to securely store a user's ID and password, personalize web pages, identify visited parts of a site and keep track of user's selections. The Ware Centre of Dental Excellence website uses cookies to keep track of your preferences and we may use cookies so we can provide you personalised information based on preferences you've indicated while using our website. If you signup with the Ware Centre of Dental Excellence website cookies are essential for personalising your website experience.
You have the option to prevent the use of cookies on your PC but please be aware disabling cookies will limit the functionality we can offer at the Ware Centre of Dental Excellence website. To find out more about setting your cookie preferences visit the website appropriate to your own browser.

Comments, suggestions and complaints

Please contact Jeremy Hill at the practice for a comment, suggestion or a complaint about your data processing at www.info@wcode.co.uk or 01920 460190 or by writing to or visiting the practice at Ware Centre of Dental Excellence, 23-24 Tudor Square, West Street, Ware, Herts SG12 9XF. We take complaints very seriously.

If you are unhappy with our response or if you need any advice you should contact the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Their telephone number is 0303 123 1113, you can also chat online with an advisor. The ICO can investigate your claim and take action against anyone who’s misused personal data. You can also visit their website for information on how to make a data protection complaint.