This accessibility statement applies to all websites under the www.bfwh.nhs.uk domain. This includes:
This website is managed by Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Our aim is to provide accessible information and ensure equal access to our services, so that everyone can use the website.
We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- change colours, contrast levels and fonts
- zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
- navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
- navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
- listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)
We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.
AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.
How accessible this website is:
We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:
- you cannot modify the line height or spacing of text
- some PDF documents may not be fully accessible to screen reader software
- live video streams do not have captions
- some of our online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
- some of our images do not have proper names or captions and ALT (alternative) text.
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:
- Email: bfwh.trustcommunications@nhs.net
- Call: 01253 300000
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.
If you cannot view the map on our contact us page, call or email us for directions.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact:
Communications team
Blackpool Victoria Hospital
Home 15
Whinney Heys Road
Blackpool
FY3 8NR
Email: bfwh.trustcommunications@nhs.net
Call: 01253 300000
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 days.
or contact our website administrator:
Rebecca Livesey
Joint Head of Digital Communications
Email Rebecca.Livesey@nhs.net
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person
We provide a text relay service for people who are D/deaf, hearing impaired or have a speech impediment.
Some areas have audio induction loops, or if you contact us before your visit we can arrange a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.
You can contact our Patient Relations team for more information.
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.
Non-accessible content
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons:
- Board and Council papers, some statutory information such as transactions, Trust policies and patient information leaflets are provided only in PDF format and do not meet accessibility standards.
- Some images do not have a text alternative, so people using a screen reader cannot access the information. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content). All images uploaded in 2023 have alt text but some before this time do not. A new website will be launched by by October 2023 and all images will have alt text. When we publish new content we’ll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.
- There is no access to cookies menu by keyboard which fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.1.1 keyboard. This is being investigated by the Trust’s IT team and will be fixed by the end of August 2023. This will also be available on the new website launching by October 2023.
- Some links under the latest news section on the homepage, do not have discernable text. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.4 Link Purpose (In Context) and WCAG 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value. This will be fixed when the new website is launched by October 2023.
Disproportionate burden
Navigation and accessing information
There is no way to skip the repeated content in the page header (for example, a ‘skip to main content’ option).
It’s not always possible to change the device orientation from horizontal to vertical without making it more difficult to view the content.
It’s not always possible for users to change text size without some of the content overlapping.
Assessment of costs and benefits
We believe that:
- The size, resources and nature of our organisation mean that there are limited public resources available which must be managed appropriately and in the public interest to prioritise the delivery of essential services to the public
- The costs of paying for detailed checks for all our websites and fixing all of the documents on our main websites would be a substantial burden on us and the public resources we manage
- The benefit to users would be limited and their needs can be met in other ways
- Therefore, doing detailed checks on all of our websites and fixing all documents on our main website would impose a disproportionate burden on us.
As listed above, we believe that fixing these issues now, whilst we focus on the development of a new website, would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We will make another assessment when we launch the new website by October 2023.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
PDFs and other documents
Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. When we launch the new website by October 2023, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.
The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.
Any new PDFs or other documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.
Live video
We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.
What we’re doing to improve accessibility
We regularly review what we are doing in terms of providing better accessibility to our websites. We are currently reviewing assistive technologies that will sit on our website and allow all users to easily access information, change contrasts, read aloud sections of the site (including PDF documents) without the need of other assistive technologies.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 11 July 2023 and last reviewed on 26 July 2023.
This website was last tested in July 2023. The test was carried out by Beckie Livesey, Head of Digital Communications on https://www.accessibilitychecker.org.
We use WordPress as the content management system for our sites, which means that some of the content on the pages is not editable / able to be corrected easily.
Legal Disclaimer
Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is not responsible for the translations provided by Google Translate. Please be aware that the English version of our website is the official text. The translated copies of our site are not legally binding, and any differences created in translation have no legal effect. If there are any concerns regarding the accuracy of the information presented within the translated versions of our site, please refer back to the official English-language website.