Privacy & Cookies

Last updated: 28 September 2026

Past Medical History is an independent, non-commercial website about the history of medicine. This page explains the limited ways in which information may be processed when you use the site.

Personal information

Past Medical History does not require you to create an account and does not collect personal information for advertising or marketing.

If you contact us, we will receive the information you choose to provide, such as your name, email address and message. This will be used only to respond to your enquiry or deal with related correspondence.

If you leave a comment on an article, we collect the name and email address you submit, together with the comment text. Your name and comment may appear publicly after moderation. Your email address is kept private and is used only for comment administration (for example moderation and abuse prevention). We do not use comment emails for marketing or mailing lists.

Website and server information

The services used to host and operate the website may automatically process limited technical information, such as IP addresses, browser information, requested pages and security or diagnostic logs. This is part of the normal technical operation and security of a website.

Cookies and tracking

Past Medical History does not use advertising cookies or behavioural advertising profiles, and we do not sell information about visitors.

With your consent, we use Google Analytics 4 to understand aggregate how the public site is used (for example approximate visitor and page-view counts). Analytics cookies are optional. They are set only if you choose Accept analytics on the cookie notice. You can decline analytics; the site will still work.

When analytics is enabled, Google may process technical information such as page URLs visited, approximate location derived from IP address, device/browser type, and similar usage metrics. We configure analytics not to send personal identifiers such as your name or email address, and we do not use Google Analytics for advertising personalisation on this site.

Your analytics choice is stored in a first-party cookie (pmh_analytics_consent) so we can remember it. Google may also set its own analytics cookies when you consent. Further detail on Google's processing is available in Google's own privacy documentation.

External links

Articles may contain links to other websites and resources. Those websites have their own privacy practices, and Past Medical History is not responsible for how external sites handle information.

Your information

If you have contacted us or left a comment and would like to ask about, correct or delete personal information we hold about that correspondence or comment, please contact us through the Contact page.

Changes to this page

This page may be updated if the website or the services it uses change. The date above shows when it was last revised.

Contact

For questions about this privacy notice, please use the Contact page.