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Your privacy is very important to us. This privacy policy provides information about the personal information that we collect and the ways in which we use that personal information. By using or accessing TransplantNet, you accept and agree to our privacy policy and our terms and conditions in their entirety.

Anonymous information collection

TransplantNet may collect and use the following kinds of anonymous information:

  • anonymous information about your use of this website, including which pages you visit; and
  • your general location, computer operating system, and internet browser via Google Analytics.

We do NOT collect demographic or interests information. Google Analytics does NOT record personal information about our website users.

Using anonymous information

TransplantNet may use your anonymous information to measure how users interact with website content.

Personal information collection

TransplantNet may collect and use the following kinds of personal information:

  • your email address and name when you subscribe to our newsletter;
  • all information that you provide for the purpose of registering with the TransplantNet user portal and using the TransplantNet electronic correspondence service;
  • electronic correspondence that you send on the user portal;
  • all information that you provide when you fill out a form on our website in order to contact an administrator, including name and email address; and
  • any other information that you send to TransplantNet.

Using personal information

TransplantNet may use your personal information to:

  • administer this website;
  • send you communications via email;
  • enable your access to and use of certain website services, especially the electronic correspondence service and user portal functions; and
  • publish information about you on the website if and only if you clearly indicate your consent when submitting a form, especially the “Send a Letter” form on the user portal.

Where TransplantNet discloses your personal information to its team members and coordinators for these purposes, the team member or coordinator in question will be obligated to use that personal information in accordance with the terms of this privacy statement.

In addition to the disclosures reasonably necessary for the purposes identified elsewhere above, TransplantNet may disclose your personal information to the extent that it is required to do so by law, in connection with any legal proceedings or prospective legal proceedings, and in order to establish, exercise or defend its legal rights.

We do not sell, trade, or otherwise transfer your personal information to ouside parties.

Securing your data

TransplantNet takes significant technical and organizational precautions to prevent the loss, misuse or alteration of your personal information. All information submitted on the TransplantNet user portal is transmitted via secure socket layer (SSL) encryption technology. TransplantNet will store all personal information and correspondence that you submit on the user portal in a database on a secure server. Only administrators with special access rights to the database are authorized to access the database and view the database entries. However, no security measures are impenatrable. As a user of TransplantNet, you must accept the inherent risks that come with entering your information on our site and using our system to send correspondence. We cannot guarantee that only authorized persons will view your information and correspondence, and we are not responsible for third party circumvention of our security measures. To reduce the risk of an account breach, we suggest that you use a strong and unique password for your TransplantNet account. We also suggest that you delete your account once you have no further need or desire to use the TransplantNet user portal. When you delete your account, your account information is permanently deleted from our database.

Who is authorized to view and use your data

The following persons are expressly authorized to view and use any of your personal information:

  • TransplantNet administrators
  • Coordinators to whom your correspondence sent via the TransplantNet user portal is forwarded

Coordinators may edit your correspondence sent via the TransplantNet user portal to the extent that they deem necessary. They may or may not notify you when they make such edits.

Intended recipients of your correspondence sent via the TransplantNet user portal will be able to view the contents, including file attachments, of your correspondence once a coordinator forwards it to them by means of email or mail. When and if you choose to share your personal information with the intended recipient(s) of your correspondence, you do so at your own discretion and accept all risks and possible outcomes that may result from such sharing.

Publication of personal information

Personal information that you submit for publication on our website will be published on the internet and may be openly available around the world. Personal information that is published may be shared and linked to by other users on their social media accounts. By indicating your consent to and desire for the publication of your personal information on our website, you release TransplantNet and all coordinators from liability, personal loss or harm that may result from such publication. If and when we choose to post correspondence that you submit for publication on the main website, we will NOT post any of your identifiable information such as your full name, loved one’s name, email address, transplant center, or OPO under which you registered your user portal account.

Data transfers

Information that TransplantNet collects may be stored and processed in and transferred between any of the countries in which TransplantNet operates to enable the use of the information in accordance with this privacy policy.

Third party links

This website contains links to other websites. These third party websites have separate and independent policies and practices. We therefore have no responsibility or liability for the content, policies and activities of these linked websites; users may visit them at their own risk. Nonetheless, we seek to protect the integrity of our website and welcome any feedback about third party links.

Use of cookies

Our website uses cookies to capture and remember certain user information. You may disable cookies through your browser preferences at any time. However, you must enable cookies in order to log into your TransplantNet account on the user portal.

We use first-party cookies to:

  • tell Google Analytics to measure the TransplantNet domain;
  • distinguish unique users;
  • remember the number and time of previous visits;
  • remember traffic source information;
  • determine whether to enable caching for a user;
  • determine the start and end of a session; and
  • remember the value of visitor-level custom variables.

When you login to your account on the user portal, our website uses a single cookie that maintains your session by associating you with data that is set and stored on the server side.

Cookies are small text files that are generated by a web page server and transferred to your computers hard drive through your internet browser. The information in the cookie is set by the server and is available to the server whenever the user visits the website.

Definitions and clarifications
  • References to “us,” “we,” and “our” mean TransplantNet.
  • The term “user portal” means the section of our website in which donor family, transplant recipient, and coordinator users can register and log into their TransplantNet accounts to perform actions related to correspondence between transplant recipients and the families of their donors. The user portal is linked here. All user portal pages include “transplantnet.org/portal” in their URL.
  • The term “main website” means the section of our website intended for all users in which users may learn about TransplantNet’s purposes and services, read instructions, browse published letters, and more. Main website pages are not located in the portal directory.
  • The term “coordinators” means the OPOs and transplant centers that are associated with a TransplantNet user portal account and that are participants in TransplantNet’s electronic correspondence service.
  • Even though our privacy policy and terms are viewable on the main website, use of any and all sections of our website signifies understanding and acceptance of the documents. The “user portal” and “main website” are not separate bodies, but are rather terms simply used to distinguish between certain services of TransplantNet.

Updating this policy

TransplantNet may update this privacy policy by posting a new version on this website, upon which we will update the modification date below. You should check this page occasionally to ensure you are familiar with any changes.

This policy was last modified on 11 August 2014.

Contact TransplantNet

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or TransplantNet’s treatment of your personal information, please write:

  • through the “Contact Us” form on this website, linked here;
  • by email to gro.tentnalpsnart@nimda; or
  • by post to 505 Parnassus Ave, Box 0780, M-884, San Francisco, California, 94143-0116.