Harvard Dental Center
Patient Portal User Agreement
Welcome to the Harvard Dental Center Patient Portal. The Portal is provided to you as a convenience so that you may have an online means to access certain information related to your care at the Center. The Center reserves the right to change, suspend, and/or terminate the Portal at any time and to update or change this User Agreement at any time (the User Agreement in effect will be posted on the Center’s website).
USE OF PATIENT PORTALThe Center provides the Portal to allow its patients to: (a) view the demographic portion of their dental record (name, address, phone number, date of birth) and update or request an update to that information; (b) view a list of past and future appointments at the Center (date, time, name of provider), (c) complete and submit a health history form, and (d) view some of the health information patients have provided to the Center (e.g., allergies and other health issues such as high blood pressure, joint replacements, etc.). You must be 18 years of age or older (or an Emancipated Minor) to use the Portal.
The Portal does not enable patients to communicate with the Center (other than request an update to demographic information) or any particular provider. The Portal is not meant to be used in any manner in the case of an emergency. If you experience an emergency, you should not communicate this through the Portal, but instead you should immediately seek appropriate care. The information you can access through the Portal should not be considered your complete dental record. You can request a full copy of your dental record by contacting the Office of Clinical Operations at (617) 432-8304.
PRIVACY AND SECURITY
The Center is committed to respecting your privacy and maintaining the confidentiality of your information. We have detailed policies and procedures regarding access to records. For information about the privacy of your information, please see the Center’s HIPAA Privacy Notice within the FAQ section of the Portal site.
Your Portal user ID and password are crucial elements of protecting the privacy and confidentiality of your information. It is your responsibility to keep your Portal user ID and password secure and confidential so that only you, or someone authorized by you, can gain access to your information. If you think an unauthorized individual has learned your password, immediately log into the Portal and change your password (for technical assistance, please contact IT at (617) 432-7968. You are solely responsible for protecting your password. The Center is not responsible for breaches of confidentiality caused by you.
The Portal has a secure connection and uses encryption to keep unauthorized persons from being able to access your information via the Portal. To help insure that the connection remains secure, we need to have your current (private) email address and be informed if it ever changes. You may update your email address through the Portal as needed. We will treat your email address as confidential information and we will never purposefully share your email address with any third party.
Though we use state-of-the-art security, no system can eliminate 100% of the risks of intentional intrusion or inadvertent disclosure of information. When using the Portal, information will be transmitted over the Internet, a medium that is beyond our control. As a result, while we take steps to protect your information, the Center cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information transmitted through the Portal. You agree not to hold the Center or any of its officers, directors, employees, agents or other staff liable for network infractions beyond their control. YOU HEREBY EXPRESSLY ASSUME THE SOLE RISK OF ANY UNAUTHORIZED DISCLOSURE OR INTENTIONAL INTRUSION, OR OF ANY DELAY, FAILURE, INTERRUPTION OR CORRUPTION OF DATA OR OTHER INFORMATION TRANSMITTED IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OF THE PORTAL.
YOUR CONDUCT
You agree to use the Portal in a manner consistent with all applicable laws and regulations. You agree that you shall not: (a) interfere with or disrupt (or attempt to interfere with or disrupt) the Portal or servers or networks hosting or connected to the Portal, or disobey any requirements, procedures, policies, or regulations of networks connected to the Portal; (b) transmit any file which contains viruses, “Trojan horses”, or any other contaminating or destructive features; (c) provide any information to the Center that is false or misleading, that attempts to hide your identity, or that you do not have a right to disclose; (d) create a link to, or otherwise link over from your website or web page, to the Portal, without prior written permission from the Center. If you believe that your information on the Portal is not accurate or that there is an error with the Portal, please contact the Center immediately.
INFORMATION DISCLAIMER AND LINKS TO THIRD PARTY SITES
The Portal may from time to time include information posted by the Center in the form of general patient educational materials or links to other websites. This information should not be construed as specific dental advice or instruction from the Center and should not be relied on to suggest a course of treatment for you. You should always seek the advice of your dentist with any questions you may have regarding your dental care and you should never disregard dental advice or delay in seeking dental advice because of something you may have read on the Portal.
The Center shall not be held responsible for third party material; we disclaim any responsibility for or liability related to such third party material. The Center does not warrant, either expressly or by implication, the factual accuracy of the information provided by a third party and posted by the Center, or the content in a website hyperlinked as a convenience to you. The Center accepts no fault or liability for any error or omission with respect to such information. Use of other sites is strictly at your own risk, including but not limited to, any risks associated with destructive viruses. The Center is not responsible for the privacy practices of the other websites to which we may hyperlink; you should consult the privacy statement of each website you visit. You are responsible for viewing and abiding by the terms and conditions of use and the privacy statements of the other websites. Any questions, complaints or claims related to material provided by a third party should be directed to the appropriate third party.
AVAILABILITY OF ACCESS TO PORTAL
The Center uses reasonable efforts to make the Portal available 24 hours a day and seven days a week; however, there will be instances when the Portal may be interrupted for backups, maintenance, upgrades, emergency repairs, and other reasons beyond the control of the Center. The Center will make reasonable efforts to minimize interruptions. You agree that the Center will not in any way be liable or responsible to you for any such interruptions to the Portal.
TERMINATION
You may close your Portal account at any time by contacting the HSDM Office of Information Technology at 617-432-2423. The Center reserves the right to change, suspend and/or terminate your access to the Portal at any time for any reason.
NO WARRANTIES
The Portal and the content contained therein are provided “as is” with no warranties whatsoever. WE MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, AS TO THE OPERATION OF THE PORTAL, OR THE CONTENT, PRODUCTS AND/OR SERVICES INCLUDED THEREIN. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, WE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE AND/OR INFRINGEMENT.
COPYRIGHT AND TRADEMARKS
All content included on the Center’s websites and any Portal services, including, but not limited to, text, photographs, graphics, button icons, images, artwork, names, logos, trademarks, service marks and data (“Content”), in any form including the compilation thereof, are protected by U.S. and international copyright law and conventions. Content does not include your personal information.
SITE ACCESS AND LICENSES
We grant a limited license to each user to make personal use only of the Portal in accordance with this User Agreement. This license expressly excludes, without limitation, any reproduction, duplication, sale, resale or other commercial use of the Portal, making any derivative of the Portal, the collection and use of user email addresses or other user information, including, without limitation, health information or any data extraction or data mining whatsoever.
LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
To the fullest extent allowed by law, in no event shall the Center, the Harvard School of Dental Medicine, or Harvard University (or any of its schools, departments, divisions, officers, directors, employees, agents, representatives, successors and assigns) have any liability to you for any indirect, special, incidental, exemplary, punitive or consequential damages, whether arising in contract, equity, negligence, intended conduct, or otherwise (including breach of warranty, negligence, gross negligence, willful misconduct and strict liability in tort), including, without limitation, damages arising from delay, loss of goodwill, loss of or damage to data, lost profits, revenue or savings (actual or anticipated), or other economic loss or lost profits in connection with or ensuing from: (a) the use or inability to use the Portal; (b) any claim attributable to errors, omissions, or other inaccuracies in the Portal; (c) any unauthorized access to or alteration of your data; or (d) any other matter related to the Portal or any Center content or information provided on the Portal, even if the Center has been advised of the possibility of such damages. The foregoing limitation of liability shall apply notwithstanding any failure of essential purpose or any limited remedy.
INDEMNITY
You understand and agree that you are personally responsible for your behavior in connection with the Portal. You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold the Center, the Harvard School of Dental Medicine, Harvard University, and its officers, directors, employees, agents, representatives, successors and assigns and any third-party information or content providers to the Portal harmless from any loss, liability, claims, demands, damages and costs (including, but not limited to direct, incidental, consequential, exemplary and indirect damages), and reasonable attorneys’ fees, made by any third party, due to or arising out of: (a) use or misuse of the Portal by you or any other person using your patient account or login; (b) any violation or breach of this Agreement; or (c) any violation of any rights of any third party.
IP ADDRESSES
The Web server automatically collects the IP address of the computers that access our site. An IP address is a number that is assigned to your computer when you access the Internet. It is not truly personally identifiable information because many different individuals can access the Internet via the same computer. We use this information in aggregate form to understand how our site is being used and how we can better serve visitors. Please note that although such information is not personally identifiable, we can determine from an IP address a visitor’s Internet Service Provider and the geographic location of his or her point of connectivity.
NON-PERSONAL INFORMATION AND COOKIES
The Center collects information about visitors to our site using “cookies”, which are small pieces of information that some websites store on your computer’s hard drive when you visit them. Like many other websites, we collect non-personal information such as website usage, traffic patterns, site performance and related statistics based on our tracking of your visits to the website. You can delete our cookies at any time. The “help” section, located on the toolbar of most browsers, will tell you how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie or how to disable cookies altogether.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
By clicking “I Accept”, I acknowledge that I have received, reviewed, and fully understand this User Agreement, which outlines my rights and obligations associated with the Portal and the risks and benefits of using the Portal. I hereby give my informed consent to participate in the Portal and I agree to comply with the requirements outlined herein. I agree that the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts govern this User Agreement and any dispute that might arise between the Center and me; I expressly agree that exclusive jurisdiction for any dispute with the Center resides in the courts and I further agree and expressly consent to the exercise of personal jurisdiction in the courts in connection with any claim involving the Center. I acknowledge that using the Portal is entirely voluntary.