Social media includes but is not limited to Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube and Twitter.
If the practices become aware of any postings made by our patients on social media/social networking platforms and we consider these to be offensive, derogatory or defamatory towards the practices, or if they are personal attacks or hostile towards a member of our team we will view this as a potential breakdown in the Practice/Patient relationship.
We will contact the patient (s) concerned, make them aware of this policy and consider the action (s) we wish to take. These may include inviting the patient (s) to communicate directly with us about their concerns and/or formally advising them that we reserve the right to remove them from our practice list if they continue to post such comments.
If comments have been threatening, abusive or extreme we reserve the right to immediately remove those involved from our list without notice and/or involve the Police.
We will also contact the administrators of the relevant social media/networking platform, remind them of their liabilities for statements made on the page (s) they administer as libel laws apply to social media/social networking as they do to any publication, and request that such posts be removed with immediate effect.
If you have a genuine complaint about the service you have received from the Practices these should be raised using our Complaints Procedure.
You would not expect to read derogatory comments about yourself at your place of work, nor do we.