Effective as of January, 2010

CarePartners Plus ("CarePartners" or “we”) has developed this privacy policy (the "Privacy Policy") for the benefit of the users ("Users" or "you") of its web site, namely, http://www.wellby.com, to demonstrate our serious commitment to protecting your privacy. The following information summarizes how CarePartners collects, uses and discloses personal data on and through this website.  (Please see the section below entitled “Information Collected Through the Wellby Kiosk” for our practices involving the collection, disclosure and usage of information you may submit through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office.)  By using this web site and/or any of the tools or services available on or through this site (collectively, the “Site”), you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of information from you in accordance with this Privacy Policy.  

We reserve the right to change the terms of this Privacy Policy at any time. When we make changes, we will revise the "last updated" date at the top of the Privacy Policy and post the changed policy on the Site.  If there are material changes to this Privacy Policy or in how CarePartners will use your personal information, we will notify you by prominently posting a notice of such changes here or on our home page, or by sending you an email.  Notwithstanding the foregoing, your provision of any information on or through the Site following any such change will constitute your consent to the collection, disclosure and use of such information in accordance with the changed policy.  Accordingly, we encourage you to review this Privacy Policy whenever you visit the Site in order to familiarize yourself with the most recent version.  Please also see CarePartners’ Terms of Use for more information on the terms and conditions governing the use of this Site.

Why does CarePartners need my personal information and how is it used?

To begin with, we collect personal information in order to provide tools and services that you request through the Site.  Specifically, we collect personal information on the Site (and also make available for your convenience through the Site personal information you have submitted through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office) to enable you to consolidate, access and view your health and treatment information in one easy-to-use online location, to share such information with others (such as friends, family members and your physician) as you see fit, and to communicate with others on matters relating to your health. 

Additionally, in order to provide our Users with a more personalized, relevant, and intelligent service, CarePartners regularly makes improvements to this Site. The collection of personal data greatly assists CarePartners in this improvement process by identifying the interests and needs of the many Users to this Site.  Data collection also assists CarePartners by allowing it to advertise products and/or services and present information in a more efficient manner, for example, by displaying content that is more relevant to you.

Although CarePartners' primary goal in collecting personal information through the Site is to deliver a customized and personalized service to you, CarePartners may also use the personal information it collects to (i) send Users e-mail notification of new features or information available through the Site or that CarePartners otherwise feels might be of interest to Users of the Site, send account- or transaction-related communications such as welcome letters and transaction confirmations, and provide you with newsletters, RSS feeds, or other communications or services which you have signed up for or otherwise agreed to receive; (ii) allow third party advertisers and marketers, and their affiliates, offering products or services that CarePartners thinks might be of interest to Users of this Site to deliver to you relevant information and offers; (iii) process any transactions you request and provide customer service; and (iv) perform research and analysis aimed at improving our products, services and technologies. CarePartners also collects IP addresses, or the location of your computer on the Internet, for systems administration, security and troubleshooting purposes, to enhance your User experience as you navigate through the Site, and to report anonymous, aggregate information (but NEVER health or treatment information that is personally identifiable, i.e., linked to you individually) to our advertisers, research partners and others. 

Please see the section below entitled “Information Collected Through the Wellby Kiosk” for our practices involving the use of information you may submit through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office.  

How and what information does CarePartners gather or track?

CarePartners collects both personally identifiable data (i.e., linked to you individually) and anonymous or non-personally identifiable data. First, certain information you submit through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office, such as answers to survey questions, and other personal identifying information to authenticate your identity, should you choose to provide it, is stored on our servers.  Certain of this information is made available for your viewing, access and use through the Site.  (For specific information on how we disclose and use information you submit through the Wellby kiosk, please see the section below entitled “Information Collected Through the Wellby Kiosk”.)  In addition, through the use of "cookies" (as described below) and online data entry, survey, product purchase and registration forms, CarePartners may collect and/or monitor the following data and information:

Although some of the personal information in the “Reference” column is necessary to enable Users to register on the Site and authenticate your identity so that you can use the valuable tools and services available through the Site, all of the personal information collected on this Site is optional with respect to use of the Site. Accordingly, Users can determine what personally identifiable information they wish to submit on a voluntary basis to CarePartners.  Additionally, persons submitting information through the Wellby kiosk at their healthcare provider’s office can choose to de-identify their information, i.e., ensure that it is not linked to them individually. 

In addition to the initial voluntary registration process, CarePartners occasionally asks Users for personal information at other times, including when they create personal health profiles, complete optional survey forms or fill out optional contact forms for additional information on particular products and services.   For example, when you create or update your personal profile, you may choose to submit personal health information that you can then share with your care coordinators if you wish.  In addition, you may be offered the opportunity to make online purchases through the Site which will require submitting personal information through CarePartners, such as credit card and/or other financial account information, when purchasing products on the Site.

We do not store Users’ Google Health data. 

Cookies, Web Beacons and Other Information Collecting Technologies

"Cookies" are small pieces of information that are stored by your web browser software on your computer's hard drive or temporarily in your computer's memory. The use of cookies is now an industry standard, and Users will find them on most major web sites.

CarePartners may place and store Internet cookies on a User's hard drive. Cookies can save any of the types of technical information noted above, as well as username and password. Cookies enable CarePartners to personalize the viewing experience of a User of this Site. When the User revisits the Site, CarePartners can recognize the User by the cookie and customize the User’s experience at the Site accordingly.  For example, CarePartners may use cookies to recognize User access privileges to this Site, track Site usage and traffic patterns, record the date and time of your visit and your session identification number, add advertisements for products or services of interest, and estimate the Site’s audience size.  CarePartners may also use cookies to store usernames and passwords that are supplied at registration in order to improve your user experience. 

Cookies offer you many conveniences. They may be used, for example, to allow us to identify registered Users when they return to the Site so that they can retrieve previous image search results.  Cookies can also save you time by eliminating the need to repeatedly enter the same information.

CarePartners does NOT utilize cookies or other information collecting technologies to store personally identifiable health- or treatment-related information, other sensitive personal information such as financial account information, or personal contact information such as names, addresses or telephone numbers, either for ourselves or for third parties. 

Although most web browsers are initially set up to accept cookies, if you prefer, a User may decline the placement of a cookie on his or her hard drive by using the appropriate feature(s) of one’s web browser software (if available) to delete the cookie.  Users should understand, however, that certain areas within this Site may not function properly if the web browser will not accept cookies. 
 

CarePartners may use other technologies, including web beacons, on our Site and in promotional e-mail messages or newsletters.  Web beacons (sometimes known as single-pixel gifs) are tiny electronic images can be used to assist us in determining how many users have visited certain pages or opened messages or newsletters. We do not use these images to collect personal information.  We may also place flash objects on your computer in order to collect browser and other information that helps us improve the security of your online communications with our Site.

Finally, CarePartners may use third party network advertisers to serve advertisements on the Site and may embed third-party traffic measurement software, such as Google Analytics, on the public pages of the Site to help us analyze web traffic. Network advertisers are third parties that display advertisements based on your visits to the Site and other web sites you have visited. Third-party ad serving enables us to target advertisements to you for products and services in which you might be interested. Although advertisers and other companies do not have access to cookies set by the Site, the Site's third party ad network providers, the advertisers, and the sponsors may themselves set and access their own cookies on your computer if you choose to have cookies enabled in your browser. These third party cookies are set to, among other things, help deliver advertisements to you that you might be interested in, to prevent you from seeing the same advertisements too many times and to conduct research regarding the usefulness of certain advertisements to you. Note that any images (or any other parts of a web page) served by third parties in association with third party cookies may serve as web beacons, which enable third parties to carry out the previously described activities. Third party ad network provider, sponsor and advertiser cookies and web beacons are governed by each third party's specific privacy policy, not this one. While we may use a variety of companies to serve advertisements on the Site, you may wish to visit http://www.networkadvertising.org/optout_nonppii.asp, which provides information regarding the "opt-out" procedures of certain third party ad servers we may use.  If CarePartners utilizes cookies in connection with the collection of information for third parties, i.e., advertisers, the relevant advertiser(s) may receive electronic notification when a User views the advertisement. 

Does CarePartners disclose personal information to third parties?

Most disclosures of personal information collected on the Site are voluntary and initiated by you, such as when you allow your care coordination team, other authorized persons within the healthcare system, or other Users you wish to share with, to access your profile information or health- or treatment-related information you submit through the Site.  Information you post on blogs, chatrooms and similar interactive areas on the Site may also be publicly viewable.  In these situations we only disclose personal information at your direction. 

In addition to voluntary disclosures of personal information at your direction, CarePartners also may share your information collected on the Site as set forth below.  Except for your voluntary disclosures and as set forth below, CarePartners will NOT disclose your personal information collected on the Site to third parties.  

1.    We may employ third parties to perform services or functions on our behalf in order to provide or improve our Site, merchandising, marketing and promotional efforts, communications or other services, or to facilitate e-commerce transactions, including processing orders placed by credit card. Those third parties may include authorized contractors, consultants and other companies working with us (collectively, "agents"). They only have access to your information as needed to perform their functions, and they may not share any of your information with others or use it for any other purpose than providing or improving CarePartners' services and offerings.  These third parties have confidentiality obligations to CarePartners and must protect personal information to the same extent as CarePartners, including not using it for any improper purpose. 

2.    CarePartners may be obligated to cooperate with various law enforcement inquiries. CarePartners reserves the right to share or transfer your registration information or other information as permitted by applicable laws to comply with a legal requirement, disclose any activities or information about you to law enforcement or other government officials as we, in our sole discretion, determine necessary or appropriate, in connection with an investigation of fraud, the administration of justice, intellectual property infringements, or other activity that is illegal or may expose us or you to legal liability.

3.    CarePartners discloses personal information in anonymous, aggregate form to third parties, such as researchers, advertisers, marketers and providers of health-related products and services, in a manner by which you will not be personally identifiable.

4.    To the extent permitted by applicable law, information about our Users, including personal information, may be disclosed as part of any merger, acquisition, or sale of CarePartners and/or its assets, as well as in the unlikely event of insolvency, bankruptcy, or receivership, in which case personal information would be transferred as one of the business assets of the company.

5.    We may also share personal information collected on the Site (but NOT health or treatment information that is identifiable to you) with affiliated and non-affiliated third parties for purposes of marketing and to provide you with offers as to products or services that may be of interest or benefit to our customers.  To the extent that you express interest in a certain product or categories of products, we may also provide you with the opportunity to obtain additional information and offers as to those products.  If you prefer that we do not disclose personal information to unaffiliated third parties for marketing purposes, or if you do not wish to receive such offers or certain categories of offers, you may opt out by contacting us at info@wellby.com.

6.    Personal information collected through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office may be disclosed as set forth in the section below entitled “Information Collected Through Wellby Kiosk.”  Note that you have the option of de-identifying information submitted through the Wellby kiosk so that we cannot link it to you. 

Note that CarePartner does NOT disclose your health or treatment information to third parties for purposes of targeted advertising. 

Information Collected Through the Wellby Kiosk

This Privacy Policy is primarily intended to describe CarePartners’ practices regarding the collection, use and disclosure of information you submit through the Site.  However, information you submit through the Wellby kiosk at your healthcare provider’s office is stored in our database.  Certain of this information is made available for your viewing, access and use through the Site.  Persons submitting information through the Wellby kiosk at their healthcare provider’s office always can choose to de-identify their information, i.e., ensure that it is not linked to them individually. 

Personal information collected through the Wellby kiosk and stored on our database, should you choose to submit such information, includes identifying information from your driver’s license or other identification card (such as name, address and license or card number), demographic information, your electronic signature, your Social Security Number or the last four digits, credit or debit card number and account information (if you choose to pay your medical bill through the Wellby kiosk), the bill itself or any other document provided by the healthcare provider and scanned by you, the name of the doctor treating you, and certain information about your office visit and medical condition, such as your responses to the survey questions relating to your treatment experience.  As noted above, submission of all identifying information is voluntary; you are not required to do so in order to answer the survey questions. 

CarePartners will NOT use or disclose any information about you collected through the Wellby kiosk except as provided in this section:

1.    Your health and treatment information will be viewable to persons to whom it may be disclosed under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act ("HIPAA") Privacy Rule (to the extent it is applicable) and applicable state and federal privacy laws.  These persons include individuals and organizations involved in your care or payment for your care, such as your doctor, the hospital or other healthcare organization that employs your doctor, and your health insurer.  Access to this information is controlled on the basis of the role of each person or organization seeking access to the information, so that access is granted only to the extent and for purposes permitted by applicable federal and state privacy laws, including to assist in your care, to ensure that you receive the proper quality of care, or the processing of payment for your care, and also to view the treatment and services you received to (i) verify that the services were actually provided and/or (ii) to evaluate the performance of your healthcare provider’s staff and ensure that you and other patients of your healthcare provider are cared for with medical excellence.  

2.    We may disclose your information when required to do so by federal, state or local law.  For example, we may disclose this information to representatives of the Office for Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services so that they may ensure that we are appropriately protecting the privacy of your health information.

3.    We may use and disclose your information when necessary to prevent a serious threat to your health and safety or the health and safety of the public or another person.  Any disclosure, however, would only be to someone able to help prevent the threat. 

4.    If you are an organ or body donor, we may release health and treatment information to organizations that handle organ or body procurement or organ, eye or tissue transplantation or to an organ donation bank, as necessary to facilitate organ, tissue or body donation and transplantation. 

5.    If you are a member of the armed forces, we will release your information as required by military command authorities.

6.    Information that is de-identified, i.e., not linkable to you, in accordance with the requirements of the HIPAA Privacy Rule may be shared in aggregate, anonymous form with third parties, such as researchers, advertisers, marketers and providers of health-related products and services.

7.    We may disclose your information to employees and third-party service providers as necessary for them to provide, maintain and improve our database.  They only have access to your information as needed to perform their functions, and they may not share any of your information with others or use it for any purpose other than as necessary to perform their function.  These third parties have confidentiality obligations to CarePartners and must protect personal information to the same extent as CarePartners, including not using it for any improper purpose.

8.    We may use and disclose information as necessary to process a transaction you have requested from us, such as using your credit or debit card to pay a medical bill. 

9.    Your answers to survey questions may be used for your benefit to notify your doctor or healthcare organization about potential risks relating to your examination or treatment.  We may also use them in combination with similar information from other patients to generate scores or ratings (including our PRQA^SM Scores) evaluating potential risks associated with, or the quality of care offered by, your doctor or healthcare organization.  Although these ratings and scores may be disclosed or sold by CarePartners to third parties, no personal information about you will be disclosed to such third parties. 

10. In all other circumstances, we will ONLY disclose personal information. (including health and treatment information) collected through the Wellby kiosk if we obtain your express informed consent prior to the disclosure or if you direct us to share the information through the Site.  

CarePartners will require any third party receiving any of the information collected through the Wellby kiosk to maintain the privacy of the information in accordance with the HIPAA Privacy Rule (to the extent it is applicable) and applicable state and federal privacy laws. CarePartners cannot guarantee that any third party will maintain the privacy of such information, even if the third party has promised to comply with the HIPAA Privacy Rule.

We will NEVER disclose personally identifiable information collected through the Wellby kiosk to third-party marketers or use it for purposes of targeted advertising.

What about external web sites?

To the extent hyperlinks are utilized to access third party sites (such as when you click on an advertisement for a third-party product), Users should be aware that these third party web sites are not controlled by CarePartners and, therefore, are not subject to this Privacy Policy. Users should check the privacy policies of these individual sites to see how their personal information will be utilized by the proprietors and operators of those third party web sites. We assume no responsibility for the privacy or security policies or practices of such linked sites, and encourage you to become acquainted with them prior to use.  For example, such sites may use cookies, web beacons, pixels, flash objects and/or other technologies to track traffic and gather personal information (as well as use and disclose such gathered information) in ways different from ours.

What does CarePartners do to keep this Site and personal information secure?

CarePartners maintains rigorous physical, technical and administrative safeguards, compliant with applicable laws and meeting high standards for medical and military system information collection, storage and exchange, to prevent the unauthorized release of or access to personal information, whether collected through the Site or otherwise stored in our database.  These safeguards include security features designed to meet strict levels of logical security, physical security and external systems communications security.  Our security features include, but are not limited to, system access controls, internal and external firewalls, encryption of personal information transmitted between your browser and the Site via Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology, and controlled physical access to our premises.  CarePartners grants access to any stored personal information CarePartners may collect on its Users only to authorized personnel and parties.

Users can further enhance the security of their information by following reasonable personal security measures.  This would include choosing a non-obvious and “strong” password (i.e., at least eight characters and mixing letters and numerals), as well as safeguarding their password and not leaving their information on an unattended computer. 

Please be advised, however, that although CarePartners has endeavored to create a secure and reliable Site for its Users, the confidentiality of any communication or material transmitted to/from CarePartners via this Site, e-mail or the Wellby kiosk cannot be guaranteed.  When disclosing any personal information, all Users should remain mindful of the fact that it is potentially accessible to the public, and consequently, can be collected and used by others without User consent.   This is particularly true for information you personally enter online into your personal health profile outside of the Wellby kiosk. When you create and maintain a personal health profile through the Site, it is similar to a social media network site, i.e., you personally have primary control over who can and cannot access your health record. Although the system itself is designed with double redundancy security features, subject to the very limited exceptions in this policy, you choose when to grant privileges or access to your profile information, which individuals or parties to share your profile information with, and whom you permit to view or access it.  Additionally, you always need to be mindful that there are no 100% guarantees of privacy and or security, or fail-safes against illegal breaches.  Accordingly, Users should consider carefully what sensitive information (including health or treatment information) they would not want disclosed to the public and should recognize that their use of the Internet, this Site and the Wellby kiosk is solely at their own risk. Users, alone, are ultimately responsible for maintaining the secrecy of their personal information.  CarePartners urges all of its Users to be careful and responsible whenever they are online.

Can I opt-out of CarePartners' data collection and/or distribution?

As noted earlier, the collection, use, and distribution of personal information on the Site greatly assist CarePartners in creating a more personalized, relevant, and intelligent service. Without the use of personal information, CarePartners could not deliver its valuable content and services in the most beneficial way. Consequently, CarePartners does ask for the submission of some personal data, although registration and provision of personal information is voluntary and such submission is not mandatory.  Furthermore, submission of personal information is not necessary to answer the survey questions on the Wellby kiosk. 

Users of this Site have the ability to "opt-out" of having their personal information shared with unaffiliated third parties for marketing purposes, and/or receiving marketing offers or certain categories of offers, by e-mailing us at info@wellby.com.  Users can also request removal of their personal data record from CarePartners' database (as described below).  Finally, Users can opt out of receiving marketing e-mails from CarePartners by clicking on the "opt-out" or “unsubscribe” link in any such e-mail sent to you by CarePartners (or by choosing the appropriate option on our Preferences page).  Please keep in mind that, even if you choose not to receive these communications, you may continue to receive transactional or account communications (e.g., confirmation e-mails) and other communications which are required or permitted by applicable law.

Do I have the ability to access and correct my personal information?

At any time, a User or other individual may contact CarePartners via e-mail to request:

• A summary of any personal information retained by CarePartners on such person,
• A change to such individual’s personal data record maintained by CarePartners, or
• Removal of such individual’s personal data record from CarePartners' database.

You may send your request to the following e-mail address, info@wellby.com.  California residents with privacy questions should also contact us at this e-mail address.  In the event CarePartners receives such a request, CarePartners may require you to confirm or verify any change to your personal record. NOTE, however, that such requests apply only to your personal data record, not to any PRQA Score or other physician or healthcare provider score or rating that may be based in part on your answers to survey questions submitted through the Wellby kiosk.  All such scores and ratings are the proprietary information of CarePartners.

What about the collection of personal information from children?

This Site, including the Wellby Kids^SM area of the Site, is not primarily intended for individuals under the age of thirteen (13).  Accordingly, CarePartners will not knowingly collect through the Site information from children under the age of thirteen (13). 

What about information I enter into third party programs included in CarePartners' Site?

As an additional service to its Users, CarePartners may include in its Site various programs and tools created and administered by third parties ("Third Party Programs") whereby, as examples, you can receive useful items such as information concerning potential diseases/conditions, information about drug alternatives, and tools whereby you can maintain records relating to your condition. Your use of these Third Party Programs is entirely optional and at your sole discretion. However, if you choose to use them, some or all of these Third Party Programs may require that you provide certain personal information such as your age, current health condition, medical history, prescription history or other health and lifestyle data (collectively, "Private Information"). If you elect to use one or more of these Third Party Programs, then any Private Information you provide as part of the Third Party Program, as well as your registration information, will be available to the third party administering that Third Party Program. By using any Third Party Program, you acknowledge that any Private Information and registration information you provide to the third party does not constitute a violation of this Privacy Policy. CarePartners will maintain the privacy of your Private Information in CarePartners' possession in accordance with the HIPAA Privacy Rule (to the extent it is applicable) and applicable state and federal privacy laws. Furthermore, CarePartners will require any third party receiving any of your Private Information to maintain the privacy of your Private Information in accordance with the HIPAA Privacy Rule (to the extent it is applicable) and applicable state and federal privacy laws. CarePartners cannot guarantee that any third party will maintain the privacy of Private Information, even if the third party has promised to comply with the HIPAA Privacy Rule.

Further Questions?

CarePartners welcomes questions or comments Users may have regarding this Privacy Policy or the use of your personal information. Please send any questions or comments to CarePartners at the following e-mail address, info@wellby.com.