Guidance on social media

We have written this document to provide guidance to registrants who use social media. It explains how to use social media in a way which meets our standards.

This document cannot deal with every issue that might come up. Instead, we have focused on the issues that registrants and others told us they came across most frequently.

This guidance is focused on our standards. Some professional bodies publish social media guidelines to support their members to get the most from this technology. If you are employed, your employer may also have relevant policies or guidance that apply to you.

How this document is structured

This document is divided into three sections.

– Section 1 contains some top tips for using social media.

– Section 2 provides guidance on how our standards relate to using social media and some relevant issues you may come across.

– Section 3 contains information about how to find out more.

Language

Throughout this document:

– ‘we’ and ‘us’ refers to the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC);

– ‘registrant’ refers to a professional on our Register;

– ‘you’ or ‘your’ refers to a registrant;

– ‘service user’ refers to anyone who uses or is affected by the services of registrants, for example, patients or clients; and

– ‘social media’ refers to websites and applications that allow you to create and share content and to interact with other users. This includes, but is not limited to, websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, as well as online forums and blogs.