Privacy Policy

This privacy notice sets out how Community Hospitals Association (CHA) collects, stores, manages and protects your personal data. It outlines the types of data that we hold and how we use them. CHA is committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected.

The CHA takes its responsibilities around the correct collection, use and destruction of the personal data of its various audiences and stakeholders very seriously and is committed to openness and fairness in the handling of Personal Data. We aim to be clear when we collect information about you and not do anything you wouldn’t reasonably expect.

Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified when using this website, then you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy statement.

The Community Hospitals Association

The Community Hospitals Association (CHA) was established over 50 years ago and is a unique voice for community hospitals - their services, staff, patients and communities.  The CHA is a membership organisation which supports community hospitals in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

We are dedicated to sharing knowledge and experience on the role, function and potential of community hospitals. We also share information throughout our networks on the contribution that community hospital services make to the health and wellbeing of patients and communities. 

We have a growing membership, and we are committed to supporting all those concerned with their community hospitals. Our aim is to act as the “National Voice of Community Hospitals”.

For more information see our website: Community Hospitals Association

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

The GDPR is a European regulation for the protection of personal data that is in force from 25 May 2018.

What personal information does Community Hospitals Association hold?
Where provided, we have the following information:

CHA does not collect patient information or sensitive personal data.

Data may be shared with Q Community or NHS Fab Stuff in lines with conditions of Innovation and Best Practice Awards processes with the applicant’s consent.

How do we collect the data?
Most information we process is obtained directly from you and organisations you work for.

We may also collect information from publicly available sources to keep your information up to date.

We will also obtain your information when we use cookies on our websites (see below).

We may also obtain your personal data through your use of social media such as Facebook, X or LinkedIn depending on your settings or the privacy policies of these social media and messaging services. To change your settings on these services, please refer to their privacy notices, which will tell you how to do this.

View Facebook's help centre.
View LinkedIn's privacy policy
View X's privacy policy

Cookies
A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your computer's hard drive. Once you agree, the file is added and the cookie helps analyse web traffic or lets you know when you visit a particular site. Cookies allow web applications to respond to you as an individual. The web application can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes by gathering and remembering information about your preferences.

We use traffic log cookies to identify which pages are being used. This helps us analyse data about web page traffic and improve our website to tailor it to customer needs. We only use this information for statistical analysis purposes and then the data is removed from the system.

Cookies help people share our content via social media and help us understand how the site is being used so that we can identify areas that are working well and areas that need improvement.

Overall, cookies help us provide you with a better website, by enabling us to monitor which pages you find useful and which you do not.
A cookie in no way gives us access to your computer or any information about you, other than the data you choose to share with us.

You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the website.

What does the Community Hospitals Association do with the data?
We use the information you give us to:

Other circumstances in which you may receive communications from the CHA

'Soft opt in'
This allows organisations to send communications by email to individuals, who we have an existing relationship with, and where we have identified that we have a legitimate interest in communicating about the CHA, provided they are given the opportunity to opt out at the time of initial communication or engagement.

How to control what we send you or request we update your personal information?

The accuracy of your information is important to us. We want to ensure that we can communicate with you in ways that you are happy with, and to provide you with information that is of interest.

If you wish to change how we communicate with you, or update the information we hold, then please contact us:

We aim to make any changes within 7 working days of receipt of the request.

How we collect information
We collect data in the following ways:

How long do we keep your data?
We will hold your personal data in our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity. These purposes are laid out in the section 'How we will use your information'.

We will keep records from Innovation and Best Practice Award applications and winners indefinitely. This is to maintain the history of the Awards.
If you request that we stop sending you marketing materials we will keep a record of your contact details to enable us to comply with your request not to be contacted.

Security
Community Hospitals Association data is held in the following places:

Your rights relating to your personal data
There are specific rights enshrined in law that you have around your data. These rights are:

We will respond to you within one month of receiving a request related to anyone of the above rights unless the number and complexity of the requests made is deemed sufficiently high in which case, we may extend this time by a further two months. We will inform you if we need to make use of this additional time and why we need to do so.

If you disagree with our approach, you may raise your concerns with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)
To assist us in responding to these requests, we may ask you to verify your identity to make sure we do not give your personal data to the wrong person, update your data with details you did not provide or take action you did not request.

Data removal

If you do not wish us to use your data, you can:

We may ask for the following information:
enough information to identify you
proof of your identity and address (a copy of your driving licence or passport).
let us know the information to which your request relates

We will aim to respond to you within a one-month period.

Links to other websites

Our website contains links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

Changes to this Statement

The Community Hospitals Association will occasionally update this Statement of Privacy to reflect company and customer feedback and to ensure compliance with GDPR. The Community Hospitals Association encourages you to periodically review this Statement to be informed of how the Community Hospitals Association is protecting your information. This policy is effective from November 2023.

Contact Information

The Community Hospitals Association welcomes your comments regarding this Privacy Notice. If you believe that we have not adhered to this statement, please contact Community Hospitals Association at info@communityhospitals.net or at:

Community Hospitals Association,
Company Number 8469880,
Registered Office: Suite 3,
1 - 3 Warren Court,
Park Road,
Crowborough,
East Sussex TN6 2QX.

We will use all reasonable efforts to promptly determine and remedy the problem.