Een ogenblik geduld
Privacy policy
This website is operated on behalf of Merck nv/sa, a company registered under number BE 0403.047.965, with head office situated at Ildefonse Vandammestraat 5/7B Hoeilaart, 1560, Belgium, and a subsidiary of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany (hereafter “Merck”, “we”, “our” or “us”). All information and personal data collected through your usage of this website is strictly for the purpose of Merck’s business activities, for which further information on our activities in Belgium can be found here.
Merck ensures the privacy of your data and respects your private life. The purpose of this privacy and cookie policy is to explain which personal data may be collected through your usage of this website and for what purpose, to inform you about cookies and other tracking technologies used on our websites and to allow you to manage your cookies and other tracking technology preferences.
In accordance with applicable laws on processing personal data (including the law of 30 July 2018 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data, Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of 27 April 2016, hereafter collectively called the “Applicable Laws”), Merck is the data controller responsible for processing your personal data collected in the framework of its activities, within the meaning of the law of 30 July 2018.
As data controller responsible for processing, Merck undertakes to process personal data lawfully, fairly and transparently and to ensure the security and the privacy of the data that has been entrusted to it.
1. What data do we collect and for what purpose?
a) Access to the website and registration
As the information we provide on this site is legally restricted to qualified healthcare professionals, or for authorized patient support providers acting on behalf of individual patients, we ask that you register and log in to access our website. When creating your personal account, you will be asked to provide the following information: first and last name, your professional title and address, professional email address and telephone number, your hospital or practice and your INAMI number (“HCP Registration Data”).
Note that there is also an option to delegate site access to personnel working on your behalf.
b) Orders on behalf of patients
When you place a patient order through the website, the following information and personal data will be processed.
- HCP Registration Data, as above.
- the following information and personal data of the patient:
- the patient name (surname and first name)
- language preference
- MS form
- dosage of treatment requested
- pharmacy address.
This information is required to coordinate your order and ensure its delivery to the chosen pharmacy address.
In doing so you will be also asked to confirm that the patient has expressly consented that such information and personal data will be provided.
Once you have placed your order, you may obtain an order summary containing the details of the equipment and medicine request, the pharmacy name and address, the language and initials of your patient, and a unique patient identifier code (pseudonymized). You may also obtain a more limited version of this confirmation on behalf of your patient, containing only the pharmacy address, patient initials and unique patient code. If you extract, print or otherwise save either confirmation, you act as a separate controller from this point under Applicable Laws and are therefore responsible for any subsequent processing of its content outside of the website.
c) Patient reimbursement requests
Where you submit a reimbursement request on behalf of a patient, the same patient information and personal data as described in the patient order section above will also be generated. This information may be then extracted and used by your patient and then sent to the relevant health insurers for reimbursement. In doing so, you also act as a separate controller from this point under Applicable Laws and are therefore responsible for any subsequent processing in providing this to your patient.
d) Remedy
If necessary, we can also use your data to protect our rights and those of third parties (for example, in relation to any breach of intellectual property regulations).
e) Browsing information
When you access and browse our websites, we collect the name of your Internet service provider, the website from which you accessed one of our websites, the name of the Merck website you are browsing, temporarily collect your full IP address and the date and duration of your visit to our website.
We use our users’ browsing data to create aggregate statistics (such statistics do not show data about any individual but rather compile data from a group of users), to determine what the interests of the users are and so improves our websites. We also use browsing data to maintain or restore the security of our system or to detect and correct technical defects and errors of these.
We also collect as data the location where the connection is made on our websites for the location where connection to our websites was made for statistical reasons (statistics regarding the localisation of connections to our websites, etc.); you can control this through your browser settings.
These data are collected using cookies. Further information on the application of cookies through the website can be found in the section below: “What cookies and other tracking technologies do we use on our websites?”.
2. How are your personal data collected?
We obtain personal data by collecting these directly from you when you use the services of our website.
3. On what legal bases are the personal data collected?
The legal basis for the processing of your personal data, whether for the management of access to the website and the creation and management of your personal account on the website or the use of product order forms and/ or associated devices for your patient, is the performance of a contract to which you are a party (Article 6 (1) b) of the General Data Protection Regulation).
The legal basis for the processing of (pseudonymized) personal data of your patients by Merck is the necessity for the purposes of the medical care of the patient (Article 9 (2) h) of the General Data Protection Regulation).
4. Who are the recipients of the personal data?
a) Merck nv/sa
As part of the order confirmation process, Merck will receive an email confirmation containing the following information, including personal data of you and your patient.
- Patient: Unique patient identifier code (pseudonymized)
- HCP: first and last name, INAMI number
- Other: Pharmacy name and address and basic order details.
This information is required by Merck as part of the order confirmation process and to send the ordered products to your patient's pharmacy.
b) External providers
We use service providers in making the website available to you.
- Website Hoster: Combell Group SA registered under company number BE 0541.977.701 and headquartered at Skaldenstraat 121 9042 Gent, Belgium.
- Website Content and Service Provider: MonkeyProof SRL, registered under company number BE (0)890.284.608, and headquartered at Daknammolenstraat 32, 9160 Lokeren, Belgium.
- Designated Patient Support Providers: Authorised to access the site on behalf of patients and to place equipment and treatment orders. Namely: Novellas Healthcare NV, a limited liability company, with registered offices at Jan de Keersmaeckerstraat 25, 1731 Zellik, registered with the Register for Legal Entities of Brussels under company number BE0825-892-939.
Acting as sub-contractors pursuant to Applicable Laws, these service providers process the data in strict conformity with the instructions from and under the surveillance of Merck and exclusively for the ends described in this privacy and cookie policy.
e) Competent external counsels or authorities for remedies
To have its rights and interests or those of third parties represented and defended, Merck may share personal data with its external counsel and competent authorities and organisms, in particular, judicial authorities.
5. Can personal data be transferred to non-european union member states?
Your personal data will not be transferred to countries outside the European Economic Area.
6. What is the retention period of the personal data?
Data that have no identifiable personal information and data that are anonymised may be stored permanently.
Data collected by Merck that can be considered personal data, are kept by Merck for no longer than is necessary for the purposes for which they were processed and according to the following table:
| Purpose of processing | Retention period |
|
Access to the website Order form |
For a period of 5 years from the last effective exchange between you and Merck or from your last connection to the website. |
| Litigation | The duration of the legal prescriptions apply (5 years, from the occurrence of the damage) |
7. What rights do you have regarding your personal data?
Pursuant to the Applicable Laws, you have a right of:
- access, which permits you to obtain from Merck confirmation of whether the personal data that relates to you are or are not processed and if they are, to have access to said data as well as to the information related to the purpose of the processing, to categories of personal data concerned, to the recipients to whom these data were communicated, to the duration of storage of said data.
- amendment and rectification, permitting you to obtain as quickly as possible the amendment and rectification of the personal data that relate to you and that are inaccurate or incomplete.
- erasure, permitting you to obtain the erasure of personal data that (i) are no longer necessary as regards the purpose for which they were collected or processed or (ii) in the event of objection or (iii) when these data have been illegally processed or (iv) when required by European or local regulation.
- objection, entitling you to object, for legitimate reasons relating to your specific situation, to your personal data being subject to processing.
- provide instructions related to the fate of your personal data following your death.
- limitation, permitting you to obtain a limit on the processing of the personal data when (i) you object to the accuracy of the personal data (ii) the processing is unlawful and you object to their erasure (iii) Merck no longer needs the personal data for the purpose of processing but you still need them to establish, exercise or defend your rights in court (iv) there is an objection and during verification of whether the legitimate reasons pursued by Merck prevail over yours.
- portability permitting you to receive the personal data related to you that you supplied Merck, in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format and transmit these data to another data controller without obstruction by Merck.
8. How can you exercise your rights?
To exercise these rights, you can complete the form on the Data Privacy Protal or send an email to privacy@merckgroup.com. You may also submit a complaint against the processing of your personal data to the data protection authority if you consider the processing of any personal data to not comply with Applicable Laws: Autorité de la protection des données - Rue de la Presse 35, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgique – https://www.autoriteprotectiondonnees.be/ –Téléphone : +32 (0)2 274 48 00.
9. What cookies and other tracking technologies do we use on our website
Cookies and other tracking technologies are small text files stored on your computer when you visit one of our websites. The cookies and tracking technologies are used by the website visited to send information to your browser thereby letting the browser send information to the website visited. Cookies or tracking technologies allow storing, for the duration of the validity of the cookie or tracking technology concerned, status information when your browser accesses different pages of our websites or when your browser later returns to our websites. We use cookies and other tracking technologies to offer you the best possible experience on our websites. Some cookies and tracking technologies are necessary for the operation of the websites. The websites cannot operate without these cookies or tracking technologies. These cookies and tracking technologies do not require consent. Other cookies and tracking technologies are only used for the purpose of anonymous statistical analysis or to improve your user experience on the websites or to display the personalised content that corresponds to your interests. These cookies and tracking technologies are not stored on your computer until you have accepted them. Typical categories of cookies and other tracking technologies include the following.
- Necessary:
These cookies are necessary for the website to operate. Our website cannot function without these cookies, and they can only be disabled by changing your browser preferences”. - Functional:
These cookies enable the provision of advanced functionalities and are used for personalization. The cookies are set in particular in response to your actions and depend on your specific service requests (e.g., pop-up notification choices). - Targeting:
These cookies may be set to learn more about your interests and show you relevant ads on other websites. These cookies work by uniquely identifying your browser and device. By integrating these cookies, we aim to learn more about your interests and your surfing behavior and to be able to place our advertising in a targeted manner.
10. What is the retention period of cookies and tracking technologies?
| Purpose of cookies and tracking technologies | Retention period |
| Cookies or tracking technologies required for the proper functioning of our websites | 13 months |
| Other cookies and tracking technologies | 6 months |
11. How to authorise, disable or delete cookies and tracking technologies from your browser
If you want to authorize, block or delete cookies, you can also do this by consulting and modifying your browser parameters.
Date of last update: June 2023