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Healthcare: what you cannot say, and what is left
Most ordinary marketing advice is prohibited or inadvisable here. What remains is more useful than it looks.
A medical practice, a clinic or a laboratory cannot do what a shop does. Advertising is governed, comparison is barred, patient testimonials are problematic, and outcomes cannot be promised.
That is why most proposals made to health professionals do not fit: they are retail proposals, transposed without anybody checking what professional ethics allow.
So this article is written the other way round from the rest of the series. It starts with what is prohibited or risky, then covers what genuinely remains — and what remains is considerable, because almost nobody attends to it.
We are not lawyers and this is not an ethics opinion. It describes principles that are broadly stable; for your own situation your professional body is the only authority, and we send you there rather than guess.
What is prohibited, inadvisable, or simply bad
Advertising for clinical activity is governed, and the governing bears less on the medium than on the content: what causes a problem is the promise, the comparison and the solicitation, not the existence of a site.
The patient testimonial is the most misunderstood case. Even with the person’s agreement, it exposes health information and suggests a reproducible outcome, which is exactly what a professional cannot imply.
Before-and-after photographs belong to the same family and are riskier still, because they constitute a visual promise no careful wording around them retrieves.
Success rates, claims of "best", "first", or "specialist in" where the title is not recognised, and promotional offers on a clinical act all belong to the same problem.
Finally, something lawful but bad: chasing reviews. A practice actively soliciting them puts patients in an awkward position and opens the door to comments describing a state of health on a public page.
What the patient is actually looking for, and nobody publishes
They are looking for logistics, almost never for medical information. The exact address, the floor, whether there is a lift, where to park, the real hours, whether appointments are taken by telephone or otherwise.
Next, what they have to bring: a prescription, previous results, a card, a file. It is the question that wastes the most time in the waiting room and it is settled by five lines on a page.
They want to know how long they will wait, and above all whether the practice works by appointment or on arrival. It is the most-asked question on the telephone in almost every practice, and the least often written down.
Finally, who they will see. The practitioner’s name, their qualification, and — where several practise — who does what. That is not advertising, it is factual information, and it is what separates a useful page from a brochure.
None of those four categories raises an ethical problem, which is precisely what makes their absence striking: the permitted part of the work is the part nobody does.
Appointments: where everybody’s time goes
In most practices, taking appointments consumes a large share of reception’s time, and a larger share of the time of the patient calling back.
The problem is almost never call volume: it is concentration. Everybody calls at the same hours, and the line is engaged exactly when it is most wanted.
The simplest fix is not software: it is publishing the hours when reception answers, distinctly from the practice’s opening hours. Two different pieces of information, almost always conflated. If the question of automating it comes up next, the boundary runs between giving out a slot and asking why the person is coming.
The second is saying what happens when nobody answers. A message giving a call-back window or another channel prevents the repeat-dialling loop, which is what actually saturates the line.
Online booking is an option, not an obvious one. It works for a standard consultation and behaves badly as soon as the reason changes the length of the slot, which is the case in many specialties.
The phone decides the shape, and that is measurable
The internet market observatory published by ARPCE counts, for the second quarter of 2025, some 59.10 million internet subscriptions in Algeria, of which 88.71% are mobile and 11.29% fixed.
For a practice that means a patient searches for you standing up, often while travelling, sometimes on somebody else’s behalf, and often while worried. That is not a context for careful reading.
The consequence is that the address, the telephone and the hours have to be visible without scrolling, and the number has to be callable in one gesture. A number written inside an image is not.
It holds for directions too. A patient looking for your practice is trying to reach it: a landmark a local recognises beats an administratively exact address nobody can find.
And it holds for the business listing, which is consulted far more often than the site itself and carries the hours people believe are current.
- Mobile subscriptions88.71%
- Fixed subscriptions11.29%
ARPCE, internet market observatory, second quarter 2025
Patient data is not ordinary data
A practice holds health information, the most sensitive data a small organisation can handle. The question is not theoretical: it decides how you take appointments.
The commonest and most neglected case is the messaging app. Patients send prescriptions, results and photographs to an account shared by several people, hosted anywhere, backed up automatically onto personal phones.
The fix needs no system: it needs deciding what is allowed to pass through that channel, telling patients, and not keeping there what has no business remaining.
The second question is the reception workstation: who has access, what stays on screen when nobody is sitting at it, and what happens when it fails.
The third is backup, and it is particular here: a practice that loses its records loses not only data but the continuity of its patients’ care. We have written a whole article on backup; this is the sector where it bites hardest.
Writing about a medical subject without giving advice
Many practitioners want to write, and it is a good idea badly executed: the text slides into advice, and advice without examination is exactly what has to be avoided.
The wording that works describes a course of events rather than a course of action: how an examination goes, how long it takes, what to bring, what it feels like, when results arrive.
That register is useful, it gets read, it commits no diagnosis, and it answers the questions people actually ask on the telephone. It also reduces anxiety, which is a professional act in itself.
The safety rule is simple: if a text could lead somebody not to seek care, it is badly written. Every page of this kind should end with the opposite of a commercial call to action.
Avoid the subject of the moment as well. Writing about whatever is circulating attracts an audience that is not yours and exposes you to questions you cannot answer online.
Reviews exist whether you ask for them or not
You do not have to ask for reviews, and you should not. You will get them anyway, because the business listing exists independently of you.
So the question becomes what to do with the ones that arrive. And the answer is more constrained than in other sectors, because replying publicly to a patient amounts to confirming that they are one.
The safe reply confirms nothing and discusses no clinical detail. It restates a general principle — professional confidentiality prevents discussing a case here — and offers a direct channel.
It is frustrating and it is the only tenable position. A practitioner defending themselves in detail on a public page commits a graver fault than the review they are contesting.
For a review that describes health information, removal can be requested from the platform on that ground, which succeeds more often than a dispute about the substance.
The business listing does more work than the site
For a practice, the listing is the first real point of contact: it carries the address, the route, the telephone and the hours, and it appears before anything else.
The most expensive mistakes on it are trivial: a wrong opening time, a badly chosen category, a number that is no longer current, a map pin a hundred metres from the door.
The misplaced pin is the most underestimated. A patient circling a building for ten minutes arrives tense and late, and that carries into the consultation.
Public holidays and annual closures are the other recurring mistake, and those are exactly the days somebody checks before setting out, often for a child or an elderly relative.
All of it is free, takes an hour in total, and raises no ethical question — which makes it the first job for any practice, before the question of a website even arises.
Several practitioners, one place: the identity problem
A group practice raises a question the sole practitioner does not have: does what is communicated belong to the place or to the people.
The practical answer is almost always the place, because patients come to an address and because a practitioner who leaves does not then take the listing, the hours and the history with them.
That means deciding in advance what happens when somebody goes: their page disappears, the listing stays. Written once, it avoids a negotiation at the worst possible moment.
It also means each practitioner is named and correctly qualified on the place’s page. A practice naming nobody is unsettling, and one foregrounding a single name creates a problem the day that person leaves.
The same logic applies to accounts: they belong to the organisation, with an email address in the practice’s name, and not to the receptionist’s or a partner’s personal phone.
What to check before signing with a supplier
Whether they know your profession’s ethical constraints. A supplier proposing before-and-after images, patient testimonials or a promotion on a clinical act does not know them, and their ignorance will be your problem, not theirs.
Where data will be hosted if a form or a booking system is put in, and what will pass through it. A form collecting a reason for consultation is collecting health data.
Who owns the domain name and the business listing. A listing created on the supplier’s account means your first point of contact is held by a third party.
What happens when a partner leaves, if several of you practise together. It belongs in the supply contract as much as in the partnership agreement.
And one simple question: ask them to write down what they will not do. A supplier with a list of refusals has met the subject; one who agrees to everything has not.
What gets measured, and what should not be
Patient numbers are not a communication indicator and should not be treated as one. They depend on your specialty, your catchment and your capacity, and targeting them directly leads to bad decisions.
What is usefully measured is wasted time: how many calls exist only to ask something already published — hours, address, what to bring. It is a number that falls when the page is good.
The second is the rate of missed appointments, which is a real cost and often responds to simple things: a reminder, a confirmation, correct directions.
The third is how many patients arrive late because of the address, which reception can ask in one sentence and which almost always points at the listing’s pin.
Those three measures share a property: they are about organisation rather than acquisition. That is the shape measurement takes in a sector where acquisition cannot be steered.
What we do, and what we will refuse to do
What we will refuse: before-and-after photographs, patient testimonials, success rates, superlative wording, and any promotion bearing on a clinical act. We will refuse even if you ask, and even if a colleague does it.
A limit of competence, stated plainly: we are not lawyers and we do not certify that your communication complies with professional ethics. We know what is plainly to be avoided; for your own situation your professional body is the only authority.
Nor do we promise patient numbers. This is the sector where an agency quoting a figure is easiest to spot, and most worth avoiding.
What we do: the permitted part, which is also the part nobody does. An accurate business listing, pin included, practice hours distinguished from reception hours, what to bring, directions with a real landmark, and practitioners named and correctly qualified.
And what you should do without us this week: open your business listing, check the pin is on your door rather than the building next door, and correct your holiday hours. It is free, it takes twenty minutes, and it removes more calls than any page we could write.
Frequently asked questions
Can a medical practice have a website?
Yes. What is governed is the content — promises, comparison, solicitation — not the existence of a site. A page of factual information about the place, the hours and the practitioners does not raise that problem.
Can we publish patient testimonials?
We strongly advise against it, even with agreement. A testimonial exposes health information and suggests a reproducible outcome, which is precisely what a professional cannot imply.
How should we reply to a negative review?
Without confirming the person is a patient and without discussing any clinical detail. Restate that confidentiality prevents discussing it here, and offer a direct channel. It is frustrating and it is the only tenable position.
Do we need online booking?
It is an option, not an obvious one. It works where slots are of uniform length and behaves badly as soon as the reason changes the duration, which is the case in many specialties.
Can patients send us documents by chat app?
It is already happening, and it is the most neglected point. Decide what is allowed through, tell patients, and do not keep there what has no business remaining — the account is often shared and backed up to personal phones.
Where do we start if we do only one thing?
The business listing: the pin exactly on your door, the real hours, the holiday hours, and the right number. Free, twenty minutes, and it removes more calls than a rebuild.
Where we come in
A misplaced pin, wrong hours and a number that no longer rings: three checks on a phone, and most practices fail at least one.
- We correct those three, which is free and takes twenty minutes.
- We write what you are permitted to say, and nothing beyond it.
- We publish the real hours, including midday closures.
No before-and-after, no patient testimonial, no success rate: in this sector an agency putting forward a figure puts you at risk and not itself.
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