Authoritative Information

Please note the authorship of all editorial content on this site, which is not referenced to other authors of peer reviewed studies, is the sole intellectual proprietary property of the author Mr. E. Charles Booth, Research Coordinator for the Canadian Asthma Prevention Institute.

As Mr. Booth is a statistical researcher, but not a medical professional, the information provided on asthmaworld.org is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between a patient/site visitor and his/her physician."   

Please also see our Terms of Use.

Privacy Policy

The Canadian Asthma Prevention Institute is committed to the protection of private information that it gathers from those who contact us for asthma education/information, website users, health professionals and other entities.

We acknowledge the trust that is given to us when we collect information from you and we will do all in our power to ensure that we honour your trust and protect your privacy. To do that, we have adopted the following principles.

COLLECTION OF INFORMATION

We will only collect personal information from you when it is necessary for one or more of our legitimate research, functions or activities.

The health information you give us will be used to provide you with the best possible information we have at our disposal to help you manage your asthma effectively.

We will not collect personal information about you or your medical condition from anyone else but you or a responsible caregiver, unless consent is given.

We will only collect information for children and young people from a parent, guardian, responsible caregiver or directly from the child or young person where that is appropriate.

We will not use unlawful or unfair means to obtain information.

USE AND DISCLOSURE OF INFORMATION

The information we collect from you will be used to respond to your asthma needs or for other legitimate research, functions or activities.

The information you give us may be used to generate statistics that will assist us to understand how people manage their asthma and to help us provide better services or resources. We will not personally identify any information used for statistical processing.

We may contact you to see whether the information we provided was adequate and to ascertain whether any further support or information would help you. We may also ask you about our service delivery and how we may improve our profile and/or services.

We will not sell, trade or distribute your contact details to any other person or organisation for purposes of direct marketing.

The information we collect will not be disclosed to a third person or organisation, including your doctor, unless you ask us to do so, or give your consent to any request for transfer of the information. In the event that you are not able to give your consent, we will act on the advice of a responsible person who is caring for you.

We will co-operate with requests from statutory or other bodies for information you have provided to us where the request is authorised by a relevant Act.

DATA QUALITY

We will take all reasonable steps to ensure that the information we collect is accurate and up-to date. Each time you contact us we will update your information.

DATA SECURITY

We will ensure that only qualified Institute staff can access your private information and we will destroy or remove personal identification from it when there is no longer an apparent use for it. If you ask us to do it, we will destroy or remove identification from your private information at any time.

OPENNESS

A copy of our Privacy Policy will  be available on our web site and will be published from time to time in our newsletter.

We will tell you what information we hold, how we collected it and how we use it, upon request.

ACCESS AND CORRECTION

You may have access to your information upon request and we will change any information you deem to be incorrect. Access will be subject to proof of identity and will be available from our registered office. We will not delete or change your records if we have received a request from statutory or other bodies for information you have provided to us.

We will not provide you with access to information for another person without their consent or unless you can provide reasonable proof that you are acting as a responsible caregiver for that person.

IDENTIFIERS

Where possible we will use a unique and personal identifier to distinguish your information. We will not disclose that identifier to any other person or organisation except under the circumstances mentioned above.

We will not ask you for or use any other identifier issued to you by any other agency, organisation or government department.

ANONYMITY

Unless there is a good practical or legal reason that requires identification, you will have the choice of remaining anonymous when providing information to us. In this case, the record may still be used for unidentified statistical data but we may not then be able to provide you with support information or follow up.

TRANSBORDER DATA FLOWS

We will not transfer your information within or outside of Canada without your consent or the consent of a responsible caregiver.

SENSITIVE INFORMATION

We will not collect personal information revealing ethnic or racial origin, political opinions, religious beliefs, health, disability or other sensitive information unless we have your consent.

We will not ask for sensitive information unless there is good reason to believe that these issues need to be considered to assist us to respond to your asthma needs and give you the best information we have at our disposal.

Sensitive information , other than health information relating to asthma, will not be included or retained in your record after we have provided our response to you. However, we may note that our response was based in part on sensitive information. This will help us if you need further support or information.

INTERNET TRANSACTIONS AND ENQUIRIES

Collection of Click Stream and other information

When you visit our web site, our server logs the following information, which is provided by your browser. This information is logged for statistical purposes only:

• Your server’s IP address or your personal IP address. These addresses are numbers unique to the machine through which you access the internet;
• The type of browser and operating system you are using;
• The address of the referring site, i.e. the previous site you visited;
• The date and time of your visit; and
• The address of the pages accessed and the documents downloaded.

We will not try to identify you or your browsing activities except, in the unlikely event of an investigation, where a law enforcement agency may exercise legal authority to inspect the service provider’s logs.

Cookies

A cookie is a packet of information that allows the computer that houses our web site (the server) to identify and interact more effectively with your computer. Our server generates a temporary cookie, which is used to keep track of the pages you have accessed whilst visiting our web site. The cookie exists only for the time you are using our server. At the end of your interaction with us the cookie no longer exists on your computer and cannot be used for further identification or access to your machine.

Our web site may also store cookies on your web browser in order to improve service for you on a subsequent visit to our web site. We may use a third-party to collect statistical data via cookies but that information will not be identified with you.

Links to other sites

Our web site contains links to other sites on the Internet. Those sites are not under our control and we cannot be held responsible for the privacy practices or content of those sites. Some sites may not be subject to Canadian Privacy Law. We suggest that you review the privacy policy of each site before providing any response or information.