Our social media principles

We want our social media platforms to be a welcoming space where people feel comfortable to talk to us and each other. Therefore, we ask that anyone engaging with our social media channels does so with courtesy, kindness, and respect. The principles below have been produced to explain what we will and will not do in relation to social media.

We might need to make changes to these principles at times. If they’re important to you, please check this page regularly.

If you don’t agree with our social media principles, then please don’t post or comment on our social media channels.

What we’ll do

• The Communications team works from Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm. We monitor and update our social media accounts during those hours, and also schedule posts to appear outside of these hours.
• We read all mentions, @ replies, comments, and direct messages sent to us. We can’t always reply to every message we receive but we will get back to you, or pass your message on, where appropriate.
• We aim to reply to messages that require a response on the same or next working day, but we cannot always guarantee this.
• We may ask you to send an email to us with your contact details, or direct you to contact a particular team, especially when it’s not appropriate for us to respond via social media. We do this so the right person can follow up with you directly about your question or concern.
• We have guidance for our staff about personal use of social media and how we will support them with this, which can be found in our Social Networking Policy. CNTW Trust staff looking to access policy documents can find them on the policies site on the intranet. For any non-Trust staff and/or members of the public, any external requests for Policy documents should be made by emailing communications@cntw.nhs.uk

What we won’t do

• We can’t discuss or comment on any individual’s care or treatment through social media, because this is confidential information and social media is a public space.
• We won’t deal with complaints through social media. There’s a process to follow for making a formal complaint, which you can find on our Complaints page.
• We can’t answer clinical or medical questions, but we’ll do our best to signpost where to get information, advice or support as appropriate. If you need urgent help or you’re in crisis, please seek help using the contact details on our ‘Need Help Now’ page. 

Taking action

We believe people are entitled to share their views, and we won’t remove a post or block someone just because they say something negative.

However, we will not tolerate posts, messages or comments which:

• Contain hateful or discriminatory comments about things such as disability, race, religion, culture, sexual orientation, gender or identity
• Contain swearing or other profane, defamatory, offensive or violent language
• Are abusive towards members of staff or the public
• Target a member of staff (we do take complaints about our employees very seriously; if you have an issue or concern about an individual please follow our Complaints process.)
• Contain links to inappropriate material
• Discuss illegal activity
• Share someone’s confidential or personal information
• Contain irrelevant advertising
• Are mean-spirited or intended to cause offence or hurt

If we believe a post, comment or message directed at us goes against these standards, we may hide or delete the comment, block the account that posted it, and/or report it to the social media platform where appropriate. In certain cases, we may send comments to the police or take legal action in the case of threatening, libellous or defamatory posts.

If you have any questions, please get in touch with us by emailing communications@cntw.nhs.uk.