The Village Healing Centre website
Who we are
Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre)
Our website address is: https://villagehealing.com.au.
1. We respect your privacy
1.1. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) respects your right to privacy and is committed to safeguarding the privacy of our customers and website visitors. We adhere to the Australian Privacy Principles contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). This policy sets out how we collect and treat your personal information.
1.2. “Personal information” is information we hold which is identifiable as being about you.
2. Collection of personal information
2.1. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) will, from time to time, receive and store personal information you enter onto our website, provided to us directly or given to us in other forms.
2.2. You may provide basic information such as your name, phone number, address and email address to enable us to send information, provide updates and process your product or service order. We may collect additional information at other times, including but not limited to, when you provide feedback, when you provide information about your personal or business affairs, change your content or email preference, respond to surveys and/or promotions, provide financial or credit card information, or communicate with our customer support.
2.3. Additionally, we may also collect any other information you provide while interacting with us.
2.4. When visitors leave comments on the site we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.
An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.
3. How we collect your personal information
3.1. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) collects personal information from you in a variety of ways, including when you interact with us electronically or in person, when you access our website and when we provide our services to you. We may receive personal information from third parties. If we do, we will protect it as set out in this Privacy Policy.
4. Use of your personal information
4.1. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) may use personal information collected from you to provide you with information, updates and our services. We may also make you aware of new and additional products, services and opportunities available to you. We may use your personal information to improve our products and services and better understand your needs.
4.2. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) may contact you by a variety of measures including, but not limited to telephone, email, sms or mail.
5. Disclosure of your personal information
5.1. We may disclose your personal information to any of our employees, officers, insurers, professional advisers, agents, suppliers or subcontractors insofar as reasonably necessary for the purposes set out in this Policy. Personal information is only supplied to a third party when it is required for the delivery of our services.
5.2. We may from time to time need to disclose personal information to comply with a legal requirement, such as a law, regulation, court order, subpoena, warrant, in the course of a legal proceeding or in response to a law enforcement agency request.
5.3. We may also use your personal information to protect the copyright, trademarks, legal rights, property or safety of Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre), www.villagehealing.com.au, its customers or third parties.
5.4. Information that we collect may from time to time be stored, processed in or transferred between parties located in countries outside of Australia. These may include, but are not limited to USA.
5.5. If there is a change of control in our business or a sale or transfer of business assets, we reserve the right to transfer to the extent permissible at law our user databases, together with any personal information and non-personal information contained in those databases. This information may be disclosed to a potential purchaser under an agreement to maintain confidentiality. We would seek to only disclose information in good faith and where required by any of the above circumstances.
5.6. By providing us with personal information, you consent to the terms of this Privacy Policy and the types of disclosure covered by this Policy. Where we disclose your personal information to third parties, we will request that the third party follow this Policy regarding handling your personal information.
6. Security of your personal information
6.1. Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) is committed to ensuring that the information you provide to us is secure. In order to prevent unauthorised access or disclosure, we have put in place suitable physical, electronic and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure information and protect it from misuse, interference, loss and unauthorised access, modification and disclosure.
6.2. The transmission and exchange of information is carried out at your own risk. We cannot guarantee the security of any information that you transmit to us, or receive from us. Although we take measures to safeguard against unauthorised disclosures of information, we cannot assure you that personal information that we collect will not be disclosed in a manner that is inconsistent with this Privacy Policy.
6.3. If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.
6.4. If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.
For users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.
7. Access to your personal information
7.1. You may request details of personal information that we hold about you in accordance with the provisions of the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). A small administrative fee may be payable for the provision of information. If you would like a copy of the information, which we hold about you or believe that any information we hold on you is inaccurate, out of date, incomplete, irrelevant or misleading, please contact us.
7.2. We reserve the right to refuse to provide you with information that we hold about you, in certain circumstances set out in the Privacy Act.
7.3. If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.
8. Complaints about privacy
8.1. If you have any complaints about our privacy practices, please feel free to send in details of your complaints to Shop 1 35 Adams St, Curl Curl, New South Wales, 2096. We take complaints very seriously and will respond shortly after receiving written notice of your complaint.
9. Changes to Privacy Policy
9.1. Please be aware that we may change this Privacy Policy in the future. We may modify this Policy at any time, in our sole discretion and all modifications will be effective immediately upon our posting of the modifications on our website. Please check back from time to time to review our Privacy Policy.
10. Website
10.1. When you visit our website
When you come to our website (www.villagehealing.com.au) we may collect certain information such as browser type, operating system, website visited immediately before coming to our site, etc. This information is used in an aggregated manner to analyse how people use our site, such that we can improve our service.
10.2. Cookies
We may from time to time use cookies on our website. Cookies are very small files which a website uses to identify you when you come back to the site and to store details about your use of the site. Cookies are not malicious programs that access or damage your computer. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies but you can choose to reject cookies by changing your browser settings. However, this may prevent you from taking full advantage of our website. Our website may from time to time use cookies to analyse website traffic and help us provide a better website visitor experience. In addition, cookies may be used to serve relevant ads to website visitors through third party services such as Google Adwords. These ads may appear on this website or other websites you visit.
If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.
If you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.
When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.
10.3 Third party sites
Our site may from time to time have links to other websites not owned or controlled by us. These links are meant for your convenience only. Links to third party websites do not constitute sponsorship or endorsement or approval of these websites. Please be aware that Ocean Acupuncture Pty Ltd (trading as The Village Healing Centre) is not responsible for the privacy practises of other such websites. We encourage our users to be aware, when they leave our website, to read the privacy statements of each and every website that collects personal identifiable information.
10.4. Embedded content
Articles or pages on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, forms, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.
These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.
PRACTICE PRIVACY POLICY – The Village Healing Centre
In compliance with the Privacy Amendment (Private Sector) Act 2000, we have developed a Practice Privacy Policy that specifies the handling of your personal information. Personal Information means information or an opinion (including information or an opinion forming part of a database), whether true or not, and whether recorded in a material form or not, about an individual whose identity is apparent or can reasonably be ascertained, from the information or opinion (P57 Guidelines on Privacy in the Private Health Sector, Office of the Federal Privacy Commissioner – October 2001). The Federal Privacy Act incorporates the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) that set out the rules for the handling of personal information in the private health sector. In the interests of providing high quality health care, this practice has implemented a privacy policy that complies with the Privacy Act (1988) and the APPs (2014)
COMMUNICATION
We aim to explain clearly how personal information about you and your health is recorded and managed in this practice. Your practitioner will be happy to discuss with you the ways in which this practice complies with the Australian Privacy Principles are set out below.
COLLECTION
It is necessary for us to collect personal information from clients/patients, and sometimes others associated with their health care, in order to attend to their health needs and for associated administrative purposes. We ask clients/patients their consent for information collection on the intake form associated with their first visit.
Collection of personal information from this website: If you opt-in to our newsletter email collection, then we ask for your name and email address. This is so that we can deliver information to you in a personalised fashion. This information will never be sold nor disclosed to a third party without your express consent. We keep your information in a professional email marketing service that includes industry-standard protection such as double opt-in and encryption.
USE & DISCLOSURE
A client’s/patient’s personal health information is used or disclosed for purposes directly related to their health care and in ways that are consistent with a client’s/patient’s expectations. In the interests of the highest quality and continuity of health care, this may include sharing information with other health care providers who comprise a client’s/patient’s health care team from time to time; this may include such practitioners as GPs, practice nurses, registrars and students, allied health professionals, support staff. The use of this data is determined by what is required for client/patient care. In general, a client’s/patient’s health information will not be used for any other purposes without their consent, and consent will be sought before sharing with other health professionals.
Sharing patient information between practitioners at this practice: Currently all practitioners at The Village Healing Centre are independent practitioners. If you receive care from a practitioner other than your primary practitioner, we assume implied consent to release your file notes to the treating practitioner to ensure continuity of care.
There are circumstances when information has to be disclosed without client/patient consent, such as:
- Emergency situations
- By law it may be necessary to disclose information about a client/patient to fulfil a medical indemnity insurance obligation – e.g. mandatory reporting of some communicable diseases
- Provision of information to private health funds if relevant for billing and medical rebate purposes
- There are also necessary purposes of collection for which information will be used beyond providing health care, such as professional accreditation, quality assessments, clinical auditing, billing, service monitoring activities, improving the administration of the practice and disclosure to a clinical supervisor.
- Provision of personal or health information if requested by law enforcement agencies.
- The individual’s privacy is protected by federal privacy legislation and State privacy legislation. This practice does not send data / information to locations outside of Australia.
STORAGE
The storage, use, and where necessary, transfer of personal health information will be undertaken in a secure manner that protects client/patient privacy. It is necessary for the practice to keep client/patient information after a client’s/patient’s last attendance for as long as is required by law (7 years or until a minor turns 25 years) or is prudent having regard to administrative requirements. Data will only be accessible to authorised personnel involved in client/patient care or administration of that care. Any sensitive data to go to a third party will be discussed with the client/patient involved and the client’s/patient’s consent will be obtained and documented.
Storage of medical information in electronic databases: Where possible, medical information is stored on servers that are located only in Australia. Other personal information (for example, for use with newsletter distribution or herb prescription fulfilment) may be stored on servers outside of Australia. Your personal and medical information is password-protected and/or encrypted.
ACCESS & CORRECTION
Clients/patients may request access to their personal health information held by this practice or its transfer to another health provider. All requests for access to personal health information will need to be made in writing. Your practitioner will review and manage the request.
This practice acknowledges the right of children and young people to privacy of their health information. Based on the professional judgement of the practitioner and consistent with the law, it might be necessary at times to restrict access to personal health information by parents or guardians.
The Village Healing Centre encourages clients/patients to ensure that information held is accurate and up to date and to amend any information that is inaccurate. A charge may be payable where the practice incurs a cost in providing access. This is for administrative costs such as photocopying, etc.
Where access is restricted or denied, the reason for this will be explained to the client/patient by their regular Village Healing Centre practitioner.
IDENTIFIERS
These are numbers or symbols that are used to identify clients/patients with or without using a name e.g. Medicare or DVA numbers. The practice will limit the use of identifiers assigned by other agencies to those uses necessary to fulfil our obligations to those agencies e.g. Medicare or private health fund claims.
ANONYMITY
A client/patient has the right to be dealt with anonymously, provided that this is lawful and practical. However in the health context this is unlikely to be practical and may in some circumstances impact of the quality of care and treatment. All requests of this nature will be referred to The Village Healing Centre Director.
CONCERNS
The Village Healing Centre recognises the right of clients/patients to raise their concerns about privacy and confidentiality. Clients/patients are asked to contact The Village Healing Centre Director if they have any concerns regarding the collection, use or disclosure of the personal health information. The best way to deal effectively with concerns and complaints is to communicate openly and respectfully. We will endeavour to acknowledge your complaint within two working days of receiving it. Where possible, a response to your complaint will be provided to you within 14 days of the date we acknowledge your complaint. Where this is not possible, due to the complexity of your complaint or other factors, we will keep you informed.
DISCLAIMER – The Village Healing Centre
You should not begin our program if you have medical condition that precludes acupuncture or changes to nutritional or exercise habits. The Village Healing Centre is a wellness clinic of Registered Chinese Medicine Practitioners that provide guidance and treatment within the scope of practice as regulated by the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency and Chinese Medicine Board of Australia. Our advice is not a substitute for medical advice from a physician, and we do not diagnose medical conditions. Please consult a physician before beginning any exercise or diet program.
The information provided in this site is not specific in nature and is not intended to supersede the advice of your physician or other health professional familiar with your unique case. The information contained in this site is not intended to diagnose, treat, or otherwise intervene in any medical condition. ALWAYS seek help from a licensed medical professional for any health condition.
Individual results vary. No guarantee of specific results is warranted or implied and your results will depend on many factors.