Privacy

Introduction

“Opening Pathways for discovery, research, and innovation in health and healthcare” (a/k/a “Opening Pathways”) is a project with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to explore the discovery, research, and innovation processes being used by non-traditional stakeholders in healthcare. The Opening Pathways project has Co-Principal Investigators and several research core team members, advisors, and consultants (“the Opening Pathways research team”). This website is intended to keep the stakeholder community up to date and informed about the Opening Pathways project, including ways to engage with the research team on the project.

Scope

This Privacy Policy applies to all personal information held or accessed by the Opening Pathways project. That includes personal information submitted through the Opening Pathways website, including blogs, blog comments, online forms, email associated with the website, etc. (collectively, “the Site.”) This Privacy Policy explains how Opening Pathways handles and protects personal information submitted to the Site.

This Privacy Policy is incorporated into the Terms of Agreement (Terms) between us and all visitors to and users of the Site; please see the Terms for more information.

Collection of your Personal Information

1. Information Collected from All Visitors to our Website

We may use cookies, web beacons, and similar technologies to help us verify your identity upon return visits to the Site. We may also use third-party web analytic tools to analyze website traffic or improve our services.

We will not, however, use cookies, web beacons, or similar technologies to track users for targeted advertising, nor will we authorize anyone else to do so.

As background, cookies are small text files that websites can send to your browser, which your computer stores, that can automatically collect server domain names, IP addresses, type of computer, type of browser, and information about what pages are visited. You can set your browser to decline cookies or notify you before accepting cookies, although if you decline them, the website may not function properly. Web beacons are small bits of code embedded in web pages or emails that can be used to communicate with cookies, count visitors, and understand usage patterns.

2. Information Collected from Users Who Submit Blog Comments

Before you comment on a blog post on the Site, you will be asked for certain personal information (visitor name and email address). The email address will not be seen or collected by us; we use a third-party commenting process which hashes your email address. The visitor name you select will be displayed with your comment.

3. Information Collected from Users In Other Ways

You may provide us personal information to the Site in other ways, such as through an online form used to express interest in participating in a particular phase of the project, or through email with the research team. Please see the section below on “Your Choices and Information Sharing” on how we handle such information.

Public Content:

All blogs and blog comments posted will be publicly viewable to any worldwide visitor to the Site. You should thus be thoughtful about what information you choose to share via blog comments or otherwise on the public Site. If you are commenting on an Opening Pathways blog, your comment will be identified with the visitor name you choose, so please choose your visitor name with care.

Blogs written by Opening Pathways research team members or invited guest bloggers will be identified with the actual names of the authors.

Information You Share With Opening Pathways:

If you submit personal information to us through email or via a form to express interest in participating in a particular phase of the project, we will not share that information on the public Site. If you ask us to share your information in a certain way, such as by mentioning your research in a blog post or helping put you in contact with people with similar professional interests, we may share your information in an effort to honor your request. If you have information you want us to keep strictly confidential to the research team, you should inform us of that up front, and we will endeavor to do so, subject to this Privacy Policy. We have no obligation, however, to protect any trade secrets or intellectual property you may disclose to us unless we enter into an agreement with you to do so. Because honoring the confidentiality and privacy of our stakeholders and Site visitors is important to us, we ask you to be clear with us about your expectations and requests regarding information you provide to us.

Without your permission, we will not publicly share your name or email address (unless, of course, you choose to include such in your visitor name, your blog comment, or any other content you publicly post on the Site).

Routine Uses and Disclosures

Subject to our Terms about appropriate content, we will generally publicly post comments you submit to blogs on our Site (although there may be a delay if they undergo a pre-approval process.) Your comments will be accompanied by the visitor name you choose.
We will use the information you provide to communicate with you about matters related to your interests expressed on the Site or if an issue arises pertaining to your use of the Site.
We may share personal information and other data from the Site with vendors who help us provide the website and other services, subject to contractual requirements about their use of the data.
As a reminder, this website is public and your blogs, comments, visitor name, and other posts may be viewed by anyone in the world.

Uses and Disclosures We Would Make Only With Your Consent

Other than as described in this Privacy Policy, we will share your personal information with third parties only with your permission. We will explain any such sharing opportunities to you in advance. Please see “Your Choices and Information Sharing” above for more details.
We will not use or disclose any of your personal information for marketing purposes.

Unusual Disclosures We Might Make Without Your Consent

We will disclose information based upon a reasonable belief that the disclosures are required by law, including information requested via subpoenas and court orders.
We may report what appears to be illegal or fraudulent conduct to law enforcement authorities.
If we were to transfer operations or resources to a new or different nonprofit research project or organization intended to advance discovery and innovation, we might share personal information collected through this project with the new project or organization. If so, personal information would be handled in accordance with this Privacy Policy, including any updates made as described in this Privacy Policy.
We may disclose information if we reasonably believe the disclosure is needed to respond to a threat of physical harm or to defend or assert our or others’ legal rights.

Correction and Deletion of Your Information (Blog comments or other information)

The website content is hosted on Github, including the blog comments. Please contact team@openingpathways.org if you wish to delete a comment from the Site, and we will remove it upon request. You may also email us at that address if you’d like other personal information about you to be removed from our records, and we will make commercially reasonable attempts to honor your request. Please also inform us if you would like personal information in your records to be updated or corrected.

Security

We use reasonable and appropriate safeguards to protect personal information from unauthorized use or disclosure.

Advertising

We will not post advertising on this Site. A user who attempts to post advertising or promote a product or service on the Site is violating our Terms and is subject to sanctions under the Terms.

Children

This Site is not directed to children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect personal information about children under 13.

Contact Us

If you have any questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy or the information practices of this Site, please contact us at team@openingpathways.org.

We may modify this Privacy Policy at any time, although we expect that most changes would only reflect updates or be editorial in nature. In the highly unlikely event that we would change this Privacy Policy in a manner that would be materially detrimental to your interests, we would post a prominent notice on the Site for at least 30 days before doing so, giving visitors an opportunity to ask us to delete their prior comments or decline to post new content.

The current version of the Privacy Policy will be dated and posted here.

Effective Date

This Privacy Policy is effective April 5, 2018.