Privacy Statement
PLEASE READ THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT
CAREFULLY.
Privacy is very important to us. We also understand that privacy
is very important to you. This Privacy Statement tells you how we
protect and use information that we gather through this Medtronic
Xomed web site. Medtronic Xomed and its affiliates also operate other
web sites. This Privacy Statement does not apply to the other
Medtronic Xomed web sites. You should review the privacy statement
posted on other Medtronic Xomed web sites when you visit them. This
web site and this Privacy Statement are intended for an U.S. audience.
This Privacy Statement was last revised on April 2, 2002. We may
change this Privacy Statement at any time and for any reason.
Significant changes to the Privacy Statement are discussed below in
the Section called "Changes to the Privacy Statement." We
encourage you to review this Privacy Statement each time you visit the
web site.
By using this web site, you agree to the terms of the most recent
version of this Privacy Statement. Please read our Terms of Use to
understand the general rules about your use of this web site. Except
as written in any other disclaimers, policies, terms of use, or other
notices on this web site, this Privacy Statement and the Terms of Use
are the complete agreement between you and Medtronic Xomed with
respect to your use of this web site. You may be subject to additional
terms that may apply when you access particular services or materials
on certain areas in this web site, or by following a link from this
web site.
INTRODUCTION
The information we receive, and how we use it, depends on what you do
when visiting our web site. We collect and use your non-personal
information (information that is not identifiable to you personally)
differently than your personal information.
WHAT IS NON-PERSONAL INFORMATION?
Non-personal information is information we collect through this web
site that does not identify you as an individual person. It may
include information such as the following:
- the type of web browser software you use (for example, Netscape
Navigator or Internet Explorer)
the name of the domain from which you
access the Internet
the Internet address of the web site
from which you linked directly to our web site
the date and time you access our web
site
which pages you have visited on our
web site
personal information that has been
de-identified
If you visit our web site to read or
download information, such as information about a health condition
or about one of our products, we may collect certain non-personal
information about you from your computer. This information is
collected from your computer's web browser: If you only read or
download information on our web site, we do not collect or learn
your name, e-mail address, home address, or other personal
information about you. We may place a text file called a cookie in
the browser files of your computer when you visit. The cookie may be
stored on your computer¹s hard drive. The information that we
collect using cookies is non-personal information. US Government
Information Bulletin (I-034) contains a good description of cookie
technology at: http://www.ciac.org/ciac/bulletins/i-034.shtml. You
are always free to decline our cookies if your browser permits, but
some parts of our web site may not work properly for you if you do
so. We will not allow third parties to place cookies on our web
site.
WHAT DOES MEDTRONIC XOMED DO WITH NON-PERSONAL INFORMATION?
Because non-personal information cannot identify you or be tied to you
in any way, there are no restrictions on the ways that we can use or
share non-personal information. We are always looking for ways to
better serve you and improve this web site. We will use non-personal
information from you to help us make this web site more useful to
visitors. We also will use non-personal information for other business
purposes. For example, we may use non-personal information or
aggregate de-identified personal information to:
- create reports for internal use to develop programs, products,
services or content
- customize the information or services that are of interest to
you
- share it with or sell it to third parties
- provide aggregated "traffic statistics" and
"response rates" to third parties
WHAT IS PERSONAL INFORMATION?
Personal information is information we collect through this web site
that we can use to specifically identify you, such as your:
- name
- telephone number
- e-mail address
- medical device serial number
- personal health information
- date of birth
In some places on this web site you have the opportunity to send us
personal information about yourself. For example, you may fill out a
registration form, a survey, or an e-mail form.
You also may choose to allow us to personalize your visits to the
web site, in which case we will ask you for certain personal
information to make your visits to our web site more helpful to you.
When this information is combined with the non-personal information
that we collect through cookies (described above), we will be able to
tell that you have visited our web site before and can personalize
your access to our web site, for example, by telling you about new
features that may be of interest to you.
HOW DOES MEDTRONIC XOMED KEEP AND USE PERSONAL INFORMATION?
We may keep and use personal information we collect from you through
this web site to provide you with access to this web site. In
addition, we may keep and use your personal information:
- to respond to your requests
- to personalize your access to our web site, for example, by
telling you about new features that may be of interest to you
- to develop records, including records of your personal
information
- to contact you with information that might be of interest to
you, including information about clinical trials and about
products and services of ours and of others
- for analytical purposes and to research, develop and improve
programs, products, services and content
- to remove your personal identifiers (your name, e-mail address,
social security number, etc). In this case, you would no longer be
identified as a single unique individual. Once we have
de-identified information, it is non-personal information and we
may treat it like other non-personal information.
- to enforce this Privacy Statement and other rules about your use
of this web site
- to protect our rights or property
- to protect someone's health, safety or welfare
- to comply with a law or regulation, court order or other legal
process
DOES MEDTRONIC EVER SHARE PERSONAL INFORMATION WITH THIRD
PARTIES?
Medtronic will not share your personal information collected from this
web site with an unrelated third party without your permission, except
as otherwise provided in this Privacy Statement.
In the ordinary course of business, we will share some personal
information with companies that we hire to perform services or
functions on our behalf. For example, we may use different vendors or
suppliers to ship you products that you order on our web site. In
these cases, we provide the vendor with information to process your
order such as your name and mailing address. In all cases in which we
share your personal information with a third party, we will not
authorize them to keep, disclose or use your information with others
except for the purpose of providing the services we asked them to
provide.
We will not sell, exchange or publish your personal information,
except in conjunction with a corporate sale, merger, dissolution, or
acquisition.
We may be legally compelled to release your personal information in
response to a court order, subpoena, search warrant, law or
regulation. We may cooperate with law enforcement authorities in
investigating and prosecuting web site visitors who violate our rules
or engage in behavior which is harmful to other visitors (or illegal).
We may disclose your personal information to third parties if we feel
that the disclosure is necessary to:
- enforce this Privacy Statement and the other rules about your
use of this web site
- protect our rights or property
- protect someone's health, safety or welfare
- comply with a law or regulation, court order or other legal
process
- Please note: In addition to the ways that we may keep, disclose,
and use information described in this Privacy Statement, we also
may keep, disclose, and use personally identifiable information
that you give us through this web site in ways that we believe are
consistent with FDA and other governmental guidance, directions,
regulations, and laws.
WHAT HAPPENS IF THE PRIVACY STATEMENT CHANGES?
If we decide to make a significant change to our Privacy Statement, we
will post a notice on the homepage of our web site for a period of
time after the change is made. Significant changes are also described
below.
Recent revisions to the Privacy Statement:
WHAT ABOUT PRIVACY ON OTHER WEB SITES?
This web site may contain links to other web sites. Some of those web
sites may be operated by Medtronic, Xomed and some may be operated by
third parties. We provide the links for your convenience, but we do
not review, control, or monitor the privacy practices of web sites
operated by others. This Privacy Statement does not apply to any other
web site, even the other Medtronic Xomed web sites. We are not
responsible for the performance of web sites operated by third parties
or for your business dealings with them. Therefore, whenever you leave
this web site we recommend that you review each web site's privacy
practices and make your own conclusions regarding the adequacy of
these practices.
DOES MEDTRONIC XOMED EVER COMMUNICATE DIRECTLY WITH VISITORS TO
THIS WEB SITE?
We may contact you periodically by e-mail, mail or telephone to
provide information regarding programs, products, services and content
that may be of interest to you. In addition, some of the features on
this web site allow you to communicate with us using an online form.
If your communication requests a response from us, we will send you a
response via e-mail. The e-mail response or confirmation may include
your personal information, including personal information about your
health, your name, address, etc. We cannot guarantee that our e-mails
to you will be secure from unauthorized interception.
ARE THERE SPECIAL RULES ABOUT CHILDREN'S PRIVACY?
We care about protecting the online privacy of children. We will not
intentionally collect any personal information (such as a child's name
or e-mail address) from children under the age of 13. If you think
that we have collected personal information from a child under the age
of 13, please contact us.
WHAT ABOUT WEB SITE SECURITY?
We take reasonable steps to protect your personal information from
loss, misuse, and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, or
destruction. You should keep in mind that no Internet transmission is
ever 100% secure or error-free. In particular, e-mail sent to or from
this site may not be secure, and you should therefore take special
care in deciding what information you send to us via e-mail
HOW TO CONTACT MEDTRONIC XOMED.
If you have questions or comments about this Privacy Statement, please
use contact us at:
Medtronic Xomed, Inc.
6743 Southpoint Drive, North
Jacksonville, FL 32216
Attention: meniett.com
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