Terms of use

Last modified: October, 2023

Welcome to www.HealthUnlocked.com (“Our Site”) operated by HealthUnlocked Holdings Limited ("HealthUnlocked"). These Terms of Use (“Terms of Use”) and our Privacy Policy (“Privacy Policy”) set out the agreement between HealthUnlocked and you and your use of Our Site. By using Our Site and any online patient community accessed on or through Our Site (a “Community”), either as a visitor or an account holder (“User”), you are deemed to have accepted, without limitation or qualification these Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.

1. About us

HealthUnlocked transforms individual health experiences into support, insight and understanding for others. We do this by enabling people to share personal health experiences and information online. In turn this provides support, aids self-management and improves interactions with professionals, with the aim of improving day-to-day health and well-being. We do this through Communities, which are microsites on Our Site. Communities are online groups that are organised to facilitate discussion and support in relation to various conditions and health care topics, including general wellbeing. You may only join and use Communities in accordance with these Terms of Use. Our Site, together with all software, content, data and other materials contained therein (“Content”) are owned and controlled by HealthUnlocked.

HealthUnlocked is a private company, registered in England and Wales under company number 6596274. Its registered office address is: 3rd Floor, 1 Ashley Road, Altrincham, Cheshire WA14 2DT, United Kingdom.

2. Use of the Site

We reserve the right to change the Terms of Use from time to time without notice, as we deem necessary. We encourage you to review the Terms of Use periodically to check you understand the latest version. Continued use of Our Site is deemed to be your acceptance of any changes to the Terms of Use and if you are not happy with our amended Terms of Use you should stop using the Site.

Individuals under the age of 18 are prohibited from creating an account and becoming a member of HealthUnlocked or any of its communities. In registering as a member, you are acknowledging that you are aged 18 or above.

3. Medical advice

Our Site’s Content as well as any content on other sites linked to from Our Site, including in any community is not to be construed as medical advice or professional medical opinion and is never a substitute for professional medical advice. Even if another user appears to be a medical professional they are not in a position to undertake a physical examination or understand your full medical history. Therefore, you should always speak to a doctor or other health professional about your condition and/or treatment or changes to your condition and/or treatment. In an emergency always dial your local or national emergency telephone number (see a list here) or direct yourself to your nearest emergency department. Never delay seeking medical advice or treatment or dialling emergency services because of something that you have read on Our Site.

4. Privacy Policy

PERSONAL DATA: If you use Our Site it is likely that this will involve sharing information about your health experiences. You agree to provide only true, accurate and complete information to us via Our Site. Any personal information provided by Users, including health and health-related information, will be treated with appropriate care and security in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You may choose to register with an anonymous username, although please note that any information or experiences you share may carry some risk of revealing your true identity to other Users. Users may choose at any time to share (or not share) their de-identified healthcare experiences with our research partners, via the “Settings” area of your user account.

It is important that you understand how our data sharing relationships work and what information is shared with our different partners and Users. We have set out further information in our Privacy Policy here which we encourage you to read.

5. Non-commercial use

The Site is for the use of individuals for non-commercial purposes only. To use information gathered from HealthUnlocked commercially, or to reach HealthUnlocked Users with commercial interest, is strictly prohibited under these Terms of Use, unless expressly authorized by HealthUnlocked in advance and in writing. Please refer to the “7. Acceptable use” section below to understand what actions will be taken if you breach these Terms of Use.

Commercial use, which is strictly prohibited, includes, but it is not limited to:

promotion or advertising of a company, a product, a service or a website;
self-promotion, including of a personal cause or digital content or a service;
promotion of a research opportunity; and
recruitment of participants for a study or a project.

6. Registration

You will not be able to use Our Site properly unless you register with us. By registering and becoming an account holder, you agree that we may provide you with information about Our Site (whether by email or any other medium) that we consider appropriate in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You may opt-out of receiving these materials and notifications in the "settings" area of your account or by writing to or emailing us to inform us that you wish to be removed from our email notification list.

HealthUnlocked accounts should only be used by individuals. Any accounts portraying themselves as healthcare professionals, providers, researchers or organizations need to be approved by us.

In order to register with us and become an account holder, you will be invited to provide a password, a username and an email. You are entirely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and account details. You will never be required to reveal your full password to any representative or agent of HealthUnlocked. If you forget your password, we may ask you to answer a specific question such as your username, date of birth or postcode. Furthermore, you are entirely responsible for any and all activities that occur under your account.

You agree to notify https://support.healthunlocked.com/contact immediately of any unauthorized use of your account or any other breach of security. We will not be liable for any loss or damage that you may incur as a result of someone else using your password or account, either with or without your knowledge. However, you could be held liable for loss or damage incurred by us or another party due to someone else using your account or password. You may not use anyone else’s account at any time, without the express permission of the account holder. If you think that someone else has access to your password you should change it immediately.

7. Acceptable use

You may only use Our Site for lawful purposes, in accordance with these Terms of Use, any Community-specific guidelines if available and all applicable laws, regulations and codes of practice in the UK or in any other jurisdiction from where you access Our Site. Your contributions must:

be accurate (where they state facts);
be genuinely held (where they state opinions);
not include any illegal content (defined below); and
comply with applicable law in the UK and in any country from which they are posted.

Your participation in HealthUnlocked should be with respect, honesty, and in the spirit of supporting and learning from your fellow Users. We ask that Users respect the rights and views of other Users who present their individual health experiences, regardless of whether or not they are in agreement, and that all disagreements are expressed considerately.

Illegal content: You are prohibited from posting illegal content, in addition to the other items listed below. Illegal content should be immediately removed from the platform and includes:

Advertisements/promotion of regulated products. Any content that could be construed to be the advertising or promotion of (i) unlicensed medicines; (ii) medicines to children under 16; and (iii) advertising of prescription-only medicines to the general public, shall be taken down immediately.
Hate speech. Any unlawful hate speech, including but to not limited to hate speech based on religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender, sexual orientation or other identity factor.
Other illegal content. This content is unlikely to be generated in a community, but it is not tolerated and must be taken down immediately. This includes content related to topics such as: terrorism, child sexual abuse material, illegal drugs and weapons.

You further agree that you are responsible for everything that you transmit to or in relation to Our Site and you specifically agree that your contributions and communications must not:

contain any material that is obscene, offensive, potentially explicit, hateful, harmful, vulgar, obscene, bullying, libellous, abusive, duplicitous, threatening, inflammatory or defamatory of any person or otherwise includes objectionable material;
advocate grooming behaviours or sexual exploitation including requests for contact on or off Our Site, requests for personal information, sexual solicitation or comments;
endeavour to persuade Users into doing something that could be damaging or harmful; include unsafe content in relation to self-harm and suicide, including, but not limited to, explicit means or methods, graphic descriptions (including images), concrete plans, suicide notes;
promote any discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age;
promote false cures for illnesses, anti-vaccination advice, manipulate contents to mislead users by distorting the truth of events, misinformation or post content that originates from disinformation campaigns;
infringe any copyright, database right, trademark or any other right of any other person;
be threatening, abuse or invade another’s privacy, stalk, troll, intimidate, exclude or silence others, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety;
be likely to harass, degrade, upset, shame, embarrass or alarm any other person;
be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person;
give the impression that they emanate from us, if this is not the case;
advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse;
use Our Site to engage in any commercial activities not approved in writing by HealthUnlocked;
post any inaccurate or misleading information, or opinions which you do not genuinely hold;
publicly publish your own (non-HealthUnlocked) contact details or those of anyone else;
register more than one account for yourself or anyone else unless you are part of a moderation team;
re-register or register a new account after you have been banned;
input or transmit content that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files, or programs that are designed or intended to disrupt, damage, or limit the functioning of any software, hardware, or telecommunications equipment or to damage or obtain unauthorised access to any data or other information of any third party;
input or transmit content that contains anything which could be used to determine or alter the architecture of Our Site, or could be used to decompile, disassemble, or reverse engineer Our Site;
input or transmit anything that constitutes or contains any form of advertising or solicitation or that disrupts the normal flow of dialogue with an excessive amount of content (flooding attack) to the Service, or that otherwise negatively affects other users’ ability to use the Service or that employs misleading email addresses, or forged headers or otherwise manipulated identifiers in order to disguise the origin of content transmitted through the Service;
collect personal data about other Users for commercial or unlawful purposes;
use automated means, including spiders, robots, crawlers, data mining tools, or the like to download data from the Service – unless expressly permitted by HealthUnlocked; or
attempt to gain unauthorized access to HealthUnlocked’s computer systems or engage in any activity that disrupts, diminishes the quality of, interferes with the performance of, or impairs the functionality of, the Service or HealthUnlocked website.

This list is indicative only and not exhaustive.

Some Communities are moderated by a “Community Moderation Team”, which includes administrators and moderators. Others are moderated by HealthUnlocked. In either case, content that is reported by a User is sent to the Community Moderation Team. They may edit, delete or turn off replies to the post and may contact, restrict or warn the User. They may also decide that the User or content in question is not objectionable and no action is required.

If issues are brought to HealthUnlocked’s attention, we will determine whether there has been a breach of the Terms of Use and what the appropriate course of action is. When a breach of these Terms of Use has occurred or inappropriate material has been posted, we will take such action as we deem appropriate, including, but not limited to, editing or removing any posting or material you have uploaded to Our Site; withdrawing your right to use Our Site; taking legal action against you; or disclosing such information to law enforcement authorities as we reasonably feel is necessary or mandated by law.

Communities are associated with expert health organizations and other approved community partners and may contain material which is the intellectual property of that community partners or individual community User. Although the community partners may provide material and take an active role within the community, nothing in these Terms of Use imposes an obligation on the community partners or individual community admins to moderate the content within their community. Community partners are also subject to our Terms of Engagement for Community Partners.

8. No endorsement by HealthUnlocked

We do not pre-screen or monitor user-generated content or results procured by Users and therefore we do not endorse (and we expressly disclaim any and all liability in connection with) any content or any other materials uploaded or exhibited or otherwise exploited by Users. We reserve the right at our sole discretion to remove any content of any kind at any time. You hereby consent to any such removal and waive any claim against us arising out of such removal of content. We shall not be responsible for any failure or delay in removing any User-generated or other content.

9. Objectionable material

If you encounter or become aware of any objectionable or infringing or unlawful content available anywhere on or via Our Site, please immediately report such material (and the specific page on which it is found), or if you believe that you are the owner of the copyright or other rights in any material appearing on Our Site, or if you have any other complaint about Our Site, or any content or other posted materials, please contact us at https://support.healthunlocked.com/contact(making sure to include both the Uniform Resource Locator ("URL") for the non-complying content and the reasons you believe it does not comply). Please note that there may be adverse legal consequences if you make a false or bad faith allegation through this process.

10. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify, keep indemnified defend and hold harmless HealthUnlocked, its parent company Corrona UK Holdings Limited, their officers, directors, employees, agents, suppliers and third party partners from and against all liabilities, losses, expenses, damages and costs, including reasonable legal fees, claims, demands and proceedings whatsoever, howsoever arising, resulting from or in connection with any violation by you of these Terms of Use, including, without limitation, the submission of any inaccurate or incorrect information.

11. Third parties and third party websites and links

We may also provide, or you may find links or references on Our Site to the websites of other companies, charities or other organizations and individuals whether affiliated with us or not. By clicking on these links and accessing these other websites, you will be leaving Our Site. Some of these links are added by Users and HealthUnlocked does not verify every link posted on Our Site.

Where Our Site contains links to other sites and resources provided by third parties, these links are provided for your information only. Such links should not be interpreted as approval by us of those linked websites or information you may obtain from them.

Similarly, Our Site may be accessed through third party links over which we have no control. We make no warranties or representations of any kind as to the accuracy, currency, or completeness of any information contained in such websites and shall have no liability for any damages or injuries of any kind arising from such content or information. Inclusion of any third party link does not imply an endorsement or recommendation by HealthUnlocked.

You may link to our home page, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage our reputation or take advantage of it, but you must not establish a link in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement on our part where none exists.

You must not establish a link to Our Site in any website that is not owned by you.

Our Site must not be framed on any other site, nor may you create a link to any part of Our Site other than the home page.

We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice.

The website in which you are linking must comply in all respects with the Acceptable Usage standards, outlined above in these Terms of Use.

If you wish to link to or make any use of content on Our Site other than that set out above, please contact us.

12. Proprietary rights

The entire contents of Our Site are owned or controlled by HealthUnlocked. The content is for your personal use only, and is not for re-distribution, transfer, assignment or sublicense. The contents of Our Site may not be copied, displayed, downloaded, distributed or republished other than for non-commercial individual reference with all copyright or other proprietary notices retained, and thereafter may not be published, extracted, re-utilized, recopied, reproduced or otherwise redistributed. Nothing contained herein shall be construed as conferring by implication, estoppels or otherwise any licence or right under any patent or trademark of HealthUnlocked, or any third party.

13. Written communication and notices

When using Our Site, you accept that communication with us will be mainly in electronic format. We will contact you by email or provide you with information by posting notices on Our Site. For contractual purposes, you agree to this electronic means of communication and you acknowledge that all contracts, notices, information and other communications that we provide to you electronically comply with any legal requirement that such communications be in writing. This condition does not affect your statutory rights.

All notices given by you to us, including any complaints that you might have about Our Site, must be given to HealthUnlocked Holdings Limited at 3rd Floor, 1 Ashley Road, Altrincham, Cheshire, United Kingdom, WA14 2DT or https://support.healthunlocked.com/contact. We may give notice to you at either the email, telephone number or postal address you provide to us when you become an account holder, or in any of the ways specified in the above paragraph.

14. Content and Limitation of Liability

HealthUnlocked is a technology platform. All views, opinions, and knowledge expressed on Our Site by Users are the sole opinions of the Users themselves and are likely to relate to their own specific circumstances which may be different to yours. The owners of HealthUnlocked and the community partners we work with make no warranties or representations of any kind as to the accuracy, currency, completeness, reliability, operability, or legality of information or opinions contained or expressed within Our Site. Commentary and other materials posted on Our Site are not intended to amount to advice on which reliance should be placed. We and the community partners therefore disclaim all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on such materials by any visitor to Our Site, by any account holders, or by anyone who may be informed of any of its contents.

Our Site may include information and materials uploaded by other Users of the site, including to bulletin boards and chat rooms. This information and these materials have not been verified or approved by us. The views expressed by other Users on Our Site do not represent our views or values.

Further, Our Site is provided to Users free of charge on an "as is" and "as available" basis. You agree that access to and use of Our Site and the content available on Our Site is at your own risk. To the fullest extent permitted by law, Our Site and any individual person connected to Our Site and any party involved in creating, producing or delivering Our Site hereby exclude:

All conditions, warranties and other terms that might otherwise be implied by statute, common law or the law of equity; and
Any liability for any direct, indirect or consequential loss or damage incurred by you in connection with the use, inability to use, or that results from the use of Our Site or websites linked to Our Site, including, without limitation any liability for loss of income or revenue, loss of business, loss of profit, loss of data, loss of goodwill, wasted management or office time, and for any other loss or damage of any kind, however arising and whether caused by tort (including negligence), breach of contract or otherwise, even if foreseeable.

This does not affect our liability for death or personal injury arising from our negligence, nor our liability for fraudulent misrepresentation or misrepresentation as to a fundamental matter, nor any other liability which cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law.

We do not guarantee that Our Site, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. We may suspend or withdraw or restrict the availability of all or any part of Our Site for business and operational reasons. We will try to give you reasonable notice of any suspension or withdrawal.

You are also responsible for ensuring that all persons who access Our Site through your internet connection are aware of these Terms of Use and other applicable terms and conditions, and that they comply with them.

15. Waiver

If we fail, at any time during the term of your use of Our Site, to insist upon strict performance of any of your obligations under these Terms of Use, or if we fail to exercise any of the rights or remedies to which we are entitled under these Terms of Use, this shall not constitute a waiver of such rights or remedies and shall not relieve you from compliance with such obligations.

No waiver by us of any of these Terms of Use shall be effective unless it is expressly stated to be a waiver and is communicated to you in writing in accordance with the methods specified above.

16. Sale or Merger

If HealthUnlocked is sold to or merges with another company not owned by HealthUnlocked or its parent company, you should expect that some or all of the personal information collected from Our Site may be transferred to the buyer/surviving company. If so, HealthUnlocked will seek to obligate the acquiring company to use any personal information transferred by Our Site in a manner consistent with our Privacy Policy, but you accept that the acquiring company will be responsible for use after the acquisition and that HealthUnlocked cannot control this.

If you do not wish the personal information you provide to be subject to this possibility, you should deactivate your membership by notifying deactivate@healthunlocked.com and including "DEACTIVATE" in the subject line.

17. Severability

If any of these Terms of Use or any provisions of these Terms of Use are determined by any competent authority to be invalid, unlawful or unenforceable to any extent, such term, condition or provision will to that extent be severed from the remaining terms, conditions and provisions, which will continue to be valid to the fullest extent permitted by law.

18. Fees

Access to and use of this Service are currently available without charge. We reserve the right to charge a fee for access to or use of this Service in the future. You will be given prior notice in the event we find it necessary to charge a fee for use of this Service and if you do not wish to pay such fee you will be able to end your use of the Service.

19. Entire agreement

These Terms of Use and any document expressly referred to in them represent the entire agreement between us in relation to access to and your use of Our Site and supersede any prior agreement, understanding or arrangement between us, whether oral or in writing.

20. Law and jurisdiction

These Terms of Use and the agreement between you and us will be governed by English law. Any dispute arising from, or related to, these Terms of Use or our agreement shall be subject to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales.