You can trust us with your health

Patient gives you trustworthy content, information, and advice to help you get a better understanding of your health. Our health information is trusted by healthcare professionals around the world.

All our content is clinically peer-reviewed so you can rely on its accuracy, authority, and it being up to date. Everything on Patient meets the highest standards of clinical accuracy and ethical integrity and follows the NHS Standard for Creating Health Content.

Trusted content creation process

All our content – be it Patient Information Leaflets, editorial features, Medicine Information Leaflets, professional articles, or resources such as videos or calculators - goes through the same stringent checking and clinical reviewing process.

Trusted authors

All our clinical authors possess the appropriate academic qualifications, professional expertise, and clinical experience. On top of their professional experience, many are respected accomplished authors with work published in other sources as well as Patient.

Our freelance and in-house content creators are all professional writers chosen for their skill, subject knowledge, experience, and ability.

Authors are required to disclose any conflicts of interest, financial relationships, or biases that could affect the integrity of the content.

Trusted Patient Information Leaflets

Health professionals have trusted our Patient Information Leaflets (PILs) since 1996 to give their Patients extra information about their condition. At appointments doctors use the PILs to give their patients the extra information they need on their condition.

All our PILs are written by professional clinicians using easy-to-understand language. The PILs are easy to print out or be sent in a link in a text or email, so patients receive the extra information however suits them.

All PILs are peer reviewed by our team of doctors to ensure accuracy, that they cover everything they should, and that they give the most appropriate information and advice. Our PILs cover hundreds of conditions and health issues and we are adding more all the time. We publish more than 700 updated and new PILs each year.

Trusted editorial

Our editorial content, which accompanies our clinical content, helps you better understand, prevent, and manage conditions. Our in-house and freelance professional writers, backed up by contributions from our team of clinical authors, publish more than 400 features each year.

We go above and beyond by applying the many aspects of the NHS Standard for Creating Health Content to our editorial when it is possible to do so.

All suggested editorial is clinically approved as being suitable for writing and within our ethos, guidelines, and standards before work can begin. All editorial content follows the same thorough peer review process as our clinical content.

We speak to authoritative and experienced health professionals who offer specialist advice or first-hand experience that will help our readers. We speak to people about the health conditions they are living with. Through us they pass on their thoughts, tips, experiences, and knowledge to help others wanting to know more about the condition.

Trusted editorial independence

Patient maintains complete editorial independence from external contributors, including sponsors or advertisers – see Sponsored content below. The Patient editorial team has the final decision over content selection and publication.

Trusted Medicine Information Leaflets

We publish and update more than 300 Medicine Information Leaflets each year giving details of everything you need to know about your medication. Our medicine leaflets follow the same high clinical standards and review process as all our health information.

The medicine leaflets are always written, and peer reviewed by clinical pharmacists. They are updated every three years and in between our pharmacists will check for any updates or guidance changes. We aim to incorporate these updates into our medicine leaflets with two weeks of them being made available.

Trusted sources

All content published on Patient meets rigorous standards of evidence-based medicine.

Our content uses the most up-to-date and reliable research-based evidence, meeting recognised UK, European, US, and global medical guidelines and best clinical practice. We use the most respected sources of published research such as PubMed hosted by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), The Cochrane Library, and The Lancet and the major guideline producers such as The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network.

We only quote respected professionals with suitable experience and qualifications in the field they are discussing. We check all their credentials and, providing it is ethical to do so, we will always name them for full transparency.

Trusted peer reviews

Our peer review process means you can trust the credibility and reliability of everything that appears on Patient. As well as all written content, the peer review process is applied to work on multimedia platforms such as videos, resources such as recipes and tools such as calculators.

Each piece of content is assigned an experienced and authoritative clinical peer reviewer. The health professional will review everything for accuracy, balance, and relevance. The reviewer will make sure it as up to date as possible and reflects all latest guidance and research. The peer reviewer will assess all sources and resources for credibility, authority, and relevance.

Trusted checking and rechecking

All content is expertly proofread to check for spelling, typographic, or grammatical errors. Experienced editors ensure consistency of terminology, style, language, and overall presentation. After this stringent process there is another final check by the proofreader, the author, and the Peer reviewer.

Trusted monitoring and updates

The clinical editor monitors all the major guideline producers such as The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN). We ensure we are aware of all updates on medicines, UK government health policy, studies and research in the major journals, UK Royal Colleges, and European Associations to keep abreast of new clinical developments. These are incorporated into our clinical articles as dated ‘Clinical Editor’s comments’. This means all latest information and references are incorporated into the content as soon as possible.

As soon as there are major or multiple changes within a topic, then a full review will be arranged. Otherwise, all health information and professional pages are reviewed every 3 years.

Sponsored content

Some of our content is sponsored by trusted partners. The sponsor has no editorial input into these articles. The content is always fair, balanced and not representing one view over another. Sponsored content will always adhere to our strict editorial policy.

You will always know when an article is sponsored as there will be a notice making it clear who is sponsoring that particular work at the top of the article.

Advertising

Our content is accompanied by commercial advertising - clearly marked with 'ADVERTISEMENT' - which are operated by selected third party providers. We carefully select specific categories that we believe will display relevant ads; however, if you see any advertising which is at odds with our clinical standards please report this via our feedback form to us.

Feedback and corrections

We encourage feedback on our content. Every suggestion and notification we receive is considered and acted upon when necessary. See here for contact details.

Accessibility and Inclusivity

Patient is committed to making all our content accessible to everybody. We promote inclusivity in language and imagery, considering diverse cultural and demographic backgrounds. We are sensitive to the health needs and conditions that many of our readers may be managing.

This editorial policy helps guide the creation, review, and publication of content on Patient. Regular reviews and updates are undertaken to reflect changes in healthcare, our culture and society. We commit to providing excellent, accurate, and up to date health information.