Website Use & Accessibility

Online Privacy Policy

Collecting and Using Personal Information

When you browse, interact or communicate with us on our website, we won’t collect personal information about you, unless you provide us with that information voluntarily.

Personal information refers to data unique to an individual, such as a name, address, social security number or telephone number. We may request personal information from you at our site in order to deliver requested materials to you, respond to your questions or deliver a product or service.

We won’t sell, license or transmit your personal information outside of UnityPoint Health and affiliated vendors/contractors involved in administering or providing services for fulfillment of your specific information requests (newsletters and e-health information). We’ll disclose information in compliance with applicable laws and regulations and require recipients to protect the information and use it only for the purpose provided.

E-Mail and Asking Questions

Any online health services and health information is not intended as a substitute for direct information from a trained medical professional, such as a clinician, nurse or caregiver. You should always consult directly with a medical professional for diagnosis and treatment of any specific health problems or immediate health concerns. The information on our website is not medical advice.

We welcome your comments or questions about our website. Your feedback will be shared with our customer service personnel or clinical staff.

Please note that your e-mail, like most, if not all, non-encrypted Internet e-mail communications, may be accessed and viewed by other Internet users without your knowledge and permission while in transit to us. To protect your privacy, please don't use e-mail to communicate information to us that you consider confidential. If you wish, you may contact us, instead, via telephone at the numbers provided at various locations on our website.

Beyond answering your question, website management personnel will periodically review questions (without patient identifiers or e-mail addresses) to determine if additional information should be placed on the website that may benefit other patients.

Healthcare Content on this Site

The healthcare information provided on, or accessed from, this site has been authored by UnityPoint Health and the staff members and clinicians of its affiliates, with the exception of the healthcare information authored by and purchased from third party vendors including, but not limited to, A.D.A.M., who are responsible for the security and quality of information licensed by them. UnityPoint Health provides health care information for general knowledge and education. This content is not intended as a replacement for advice from your personal clinician or care team.

Information Security

We use security procedures to protect personal information you submit to us from misuse or unauthorized disclosure. The personal information you submit is stored in a secure database behind an electronic firewall. You can access your personal information only by using a password. We encourage you to change your password regularly and not share it with anyone.

Access to the data is limited to a few computer technicians who need to maintain the website database and who also use passwords for that access, as well as outside vendors who may occasionally assist us in maintaining and improving our hardware and software tools.

We’ll make every effort to safeguard your personal information. However, like other Internet sites, we can't guarantee it’s completely secure from cyber criminals who might attempt to evade security measures or intercept transmissions over the Internet.

Other Information and "Cookies"

When you visit our website, we collect certain information that doesn't identify you personally, but provides us with "usage data," such as the number of visitors we receive or what pages are visited most often. This data helps us analyze and improve the usefulness of the information we provide online. We don't collect information about your specific use on the site or track what you view.

We use IP addresses to collect aggregate information about visitor amounts and site usage. An Internet Protocol (IP) address is a number automatically assigned to your computer by your Internet Service Provider (ISP) whenever you access the Internet. This number may be the same each time you access the Internet, or it may change. The address is logged on our server when your computer requests information. We do collect zip code information associated with IP addresses and use this information to customize the content offered on our site to better meet our users' needs. However, to allow users to access our site anonymously, we don't link your IP address with personal information about you other than your zip code. (We reserve the right, however, to use IP addresses to identify any individuals who threaten our site, service or customers.)

As part of your use of our website, we may use "cookie" technology for our own purposes, or those of our affiliates or partners. A "cookie" is an element of data that a website can send to your browser when you link to that website. It’s not a computer program and has no ability to read data residing on your computer or instruct it to perform any step or function. By assigning a unique data element to each visitor, the website can recognize repeat users, track usage patterns and better serve you when you return to the site. The cookie does not extract other personal information about you, such as your name or address. Most browsers provide a simple procedure that'll enable you to control whether you want to receive cookies by notifying you when a website is about to deposit a cookie file. The use of cookie technology in connection with this website may include cookies from UnityPoint Health, its affiliates, or from a third-party vendor (e.g., Google) to monitor site statistics.

Linking to Other Sites

From time to time our website may provide links to other websites not owned or controlled by UnityPoint Health that we think might be useful or of interest to you. We can't, however, be responsible for the privacy practices used by other website owners, or the content or accuracy of those other websites. Links to various outside websites don't constitute or imply our endorsement for these websites, any products or services described on the sites or any other material contained in them.

Changes to This Statement

We may change this statement from time to time without notice. We plan to post notice on our home page for no less than a week if any significant changes occur. This privacy statement isn't intended to, and does not, create any contractual or other legal rights in, or on behalf of, any party.

Website Accessibility

We’re committed to providing accessible websites to the widest possible audience, regardless of technology or ability, and we comply with best practices and standards.

UnityPoint Health Accessibility Standards

New website content is compliant with the standards defined by Section 508 of the U.S. Rehabilitation Act and Level AA of the W3C Website Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), version 2.0.  Additionally, we're committed to testing the website to ensure existing content is accessible to all visitors. Existing content will be updated as necessary to comply with WCAG 2.0.

Accessibility References

• W3C accessibility guidelines explains the reasons behind each guideline
• U.S. Federal Government Section 508 accessibility guidelines

Accessibility Resources

• Online HTML Validation, a free service for ensuring web pages conform to published HTML standards.
• Opera, a visual browser with many accessibility-related features, including text zooming, user style sheets and image toggle capabilities. Compatible with several operating systems.
• JAWS, a computer screen reader for Windows. A trial demo is available at no cost.
• Lynx, a free text-only web browser for users who are blind with refreshable braille display capabilities.
• WAVE, a free service to analyze web pages for compliance and accessibility guidelines.
• WebAIM, a organization dedicated to improving accessibility to online materials.

Reporting an Accessibility Issue

If you’d like additional assistance, or if you experience an accessibility barrier on one of our websites, please contact the UnityPoint Health law office at (515) 241-4650. Please include the URL of the website and details about the issue.