Dental Design Co (“DDC”, “we”, “us”, “our”) provides dental and skin health services, and we understand that the information you share with us is personal and often sensitive.
We are committed to handling your personal and health information responsibly, and in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles, as well as the Health Records Act 2001 (Vic) and any other privacy or health records laws that apply to our practice.
This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, why we collect it, and how we store, use and protect it. We review this policy from time to time, and any updates will take effect once published on our website.
DDC, we, us, our means Dental Design Co, and includes our staff and the clinicians who provide services from our practice.
You, your means our patients, prospective patients, and other individuals who interact with our practice or website.
Personal information has the meaning given to it under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth).
We only collect information that is reasonably necessary to provide you with safe and appropriate dental or skin health care. This may include:
We usually collect your information directly from you, including when you:
In some circumstances, we may also collect health information about you from a third party, such as a referring practitioner, a health fund, or a family member — but only where you have consented to this, where we reasonably believe you would expect us to, or where it is necessary to provide you with safe care.
We collect and use your information to provide you with dental and skin health services, and to run our practice safely and efficiently. This includes:
We may also use de-identified information for research, service improvement, or to understand the needs of our patients generally — this information cannot be used to identify you.
We only use your health information to provide you with care, or for purposes that are directly related to your care and that you would reasonably expect. We will not use it for any other purpose unless:
To provide your care and run our practice, we may share your information with:
We do not sell your personal information. Where we do share information with a third party, we take reasonable steps to satisfy ourselves that they handle it in line with this Policy.
We may occasionally send you information about our services, offers or clinic updates. You can opt out of these communications at any time by contacting us or using the unsubscribe link in our emails — this will not affect your ability to book or receive treatment with us.
We take reasonable steps to keep the personal and health information we hold accurate, complete and up to date, including asking you to confirm your details at each visit.
Your information is stored securely, whether in our practice management system or in physical records, with appropriate access controls in place.
Physical records are kept in a secure location, and electronic records are backed up and access-restricted to authorised staff.
In line with our legal obligations, we generally retain patient records for at least seven years from your last visit, or, if you were a child when last treated, until you turn 25 — after which records may be securely destroyed.
While we take care to protect any information sent to us electronically, no transmission over the internet can be guaranteed completely secure, and we recommend caution when sending sensitive information by email.
Everyone on our team is trained in their responsibilities for protecting your privacy, and is required to comply with this Policy and applicable privacy laws as part of their role at DDC.
We also collect and hold personal information about our staff for employment and human resources purposes, which is handled with the same care as patient information.
You can ask to see the personal or health information we hold about you, or ask us to correct it, at any time. We will action your request unless there is a valid reason under privacy law to decline.
Requests should be made in writing to our Privacy Officer, whose contact details are at the end of this Policy. If any of your details change, please let us know so we can keep your record up to date.
Our website may use cookies and similar technologies to help it run smoothly and to understand how visitors use our site. You can manage or disable cookies through your browser settings, though some parts of our website may not work as intended if you do.
We may also use third-party analytics or advertising tools, which may collect de-identified information about your visits to our website to help us understand and improve our services.
Our website may contain links to third-party websites for your convenience. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites, and recommend reviewing their own privacy policies before sharing any personal information.
You are not obliged to provide us with personal or health information. However, if you choose not to, we may not be able to provide you with the care you need, or the care we can provide may be limited.
If you have any concerns about how we have handled your personal information, please contact our Privacy Officer directly — we take these concerns seriously and will work with you to resolve them.
If you are not satisfied with our response, you can also contact:
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, or wish to make a request regarding your personal information, please contact our Privacy Officer:
