The Acupuncture Center understands how important the privacy of personal information is to you. Acupuncture Center is committed to honoring your privacy. The document you are reading is our Privacy Policy for our Web site that is accessible by the general public, physicians, students and other healthcare professionals, and it describes what information we may collect about you, what uses we may make of it, how you can tell us what to do with your information, and what precautions we take against unauthorized access or use of your information.
This Privacy Policy applies to The Acupuncture Center's Web site. You should read the privacy policy at each Web site that you visit after you leave our site. We are not responsible for how other Web site treat your privacy, once you leave The Acupuncture Center's Web site.
Visitors to our Web site can access the Web site's home page and browse some areas of the site without disclosing any personally identifiable information. We do not track information from your browser. On most of our Web site, you do not need to register with us to use the site.
Information We Collect When You Register
When you register for services on our Web site, you are asked to provide us with identifying information, such as your name, gender, contact information, and other personal information. On our registration screens, we clearly label which information is required for registration, and which information is optional and may be given at your discretion. You will also be given a choice about whether or not you want to receive newsletters and other information that we distribute from time to time. Our Web site will explain how personally identifiable information will be used and ask for your consent before collecting it.
Information from Outside Sources
We may also collect information about persons who register on our Web site from other sources in order to verify their licensure status and identity. In some cases, we may ask you for information after you register, such as your credit card information, when necessary to process an order for purchase. Our Web site may contact financial or credit organizations to confirm customer credit cards.
Other Information
* Discussion Boards: When you post a message to a discussion board on our Web site, your alias will be available for all registered users to see. An alias consists of your username, specialty and geographic information and other information you agree to show in a profile to others. You should not post any information you want or are required by law to keep private to a discussion board or other public forum on our Web site.
* Tools: On our Web site, we may offer clinical tools that require you to provide information for the tools to operate (for example, a clinical calculator that provides information on adjusting dosage). Our tools may store information that you provide on our servers. We will always make it clear to you when information that you provide to us through a tool will be saved.
* Member Lookup: When you are registering on our Web site, you may have a choice about whether or not you want other members to be able to look you up and send you messages. If you opt not to be listed, no other members will be able to look you up.
* Additional Forms and Emails: We may also ask you to provide additional information after you register if you want to obtain additional services or information or to resolve complaints or concerns.
In addition, we gather information about you that is automatically collected by our Web server, such as your IP address and domain name. We will use this information to personalize its offerings and presentations to you, facilitate your movements throughout our Web site, provide personalized services, and to communicate with you individually.
Continuing Education
When you register for a Continuing Education (CE) activity through our Web site, we collect certain personally identifiable information from you such as your name, email address and mailing address. If you are a doctor or massage therapist and wish to receive CE credit, you are also required to provide the state in which you are licensed and your license number. In addition to personally identifiable information, we collect aggregated non-personally identifiable information about the activities undertaken by our users. We use the information that we collect through CE activities in several ways.
We may use the information we collect as otherwise permitted in this Privacy Policy.
Children's Privacy
We are committed to protecting the privacy of children. Our Web site are designed and intended for use by adults, and are not intended for, nor designed to be used by children under the age of 18. We do not collect personally identifiable information from any person we know is a child under the age of 18.
Uses We Make of Information
In this section of our Privacy Policy, we identify the ways we may use information about you that we have collected.
Aggregate Data
We create aggregate data about visitors to our Web site for product development and improvement activities. We do not use it for market analysis. We do not provide information from our Web site in aggregate form, with identifying information removed, to third parties.
Marketing and Advertising
We may target our advertising or marketing depending on information we have about you. For example, a user we know is a woman may receive advertising for products targeted at women that a male user will not see, or a user that we know is a healthcare provider who treats sciatica may receive advertising for TCM treatment and results (although in neither case will the advertiser have access to any individually identifiable information about you).
We may also personalize our Web site based on your interests. For example, you may see different articles in different places on our Web site based on information you have shared with us.
Protection of Information
In this section of our Privacy Policy, we discuss the security measures we take to protect information that we have collected about you.
General Policies
We have implemented technology and security policies, rules and other measures to protect the personal data that we have under our control from unauthorized access, improper use, alteration, unlawful or accidental destruction, and accidental loss. We also protect your information by requiring that all our employees and others who have access to or are associated with the processing of your data respect your confidentiality.
Access to Information and Choices
In this section of our Privacy Policy, we tell you how to obtain and correct information we have about you, and how to choose what types of information you may share with us.
Correction of Information We Have About You
If you believe that registration information collected by our Web site is in error, you may edit your personal profile any time that you like. You may contact Web Customer Support and ask for the changes that you would like to make.
Employees
Employees are required to keep your information private, as a condition of their employment with us. Only selected, authorized employees are permitted to access health information.
Employees with access to personally identifiable health information are required to attend a confidentiality/privacy training class, and to sign a confidentiality agreement. All employees and contractors must abide by our Privacy Policy, and those who violate that policy are subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination of their employment and legal action.
