About the British Limb Reconstruction Society (BLRS)
The British Limb Reconstruction Society (BLRS) is a specialist medical society dedicated to advancing the knowledge and practice of limb reconstruction surgery in the UK. We provide professional education, research support, and clinical guidance to healthcare professionals involved in limb reconstruction and complex orthopaedic surgery. The BLRS takes the security and privacy of your data seriously. We may need to gather and use information or ‘data’ about you as part of our activities and to manage our relationship with you. In doing so we will take all reasonable steps to ensure that your personal data is kept secure against unauthorised access, loss, disclosure or destruction.

We intend to comply with our legal obligations under the Data Protection Act 2018 (the ‘2018 Act’) and the UK General Data Protection Regulation (‘GDPR’) in respect of data privacy and security. This notice explains what personal data (information) is collected, how we collect it, and how we may use and share information about you. Please ensure that you read this notice and any other similar notice we may provide to you when we collect or process personal information about you.

This notice is effective from 5th August 2025. We may update our privacy notice from time to time by updating this page. Please ensure that you check this page when you are on the site to ensure you are up to date with any changes.

Who collects the information
The BLRS is a ‘data controller’ and to further our aims we may collect and process information and personal data about you and retain control over how it is used.

Why we collect information and how we use it
As a specialist medical society we will typically collect and use this information for the following purposes:

To enable us to administer memberships
Offer services and products to current and future members and other interested parties
Facilitate educational events, conferences, and training programmes
Support research and clinical audit activities
For compliance with a legal or regulatory obligation
For the purposes of our legitimate interests or those of a third party, but only if these are not overridden by your interests, rights or freedoms

We seek to ensure that our information collection and processing is always proportionate. We will notify you of any material changes to information we collect or to the purposes for which we collect and process it.

What information we collect
As a specialist medical society we may collect, share and use the following information:

Your full name and contact details (including home and work address and telephone numbers, mobile phone numbers, email address)
Professional information including GMC registration number, speciality, place of work, qualifications
Other data which identifies you including date of birth, gender, membership numbers, photographs of you
Profile data including username and password, purchases and orders, your interests, and feedback and survey responses
Marketing and communication preferences including preferences on receiving communications from us and our third parties
Financial data including bank accounts, direct debits, payment card details
Technical data associated with your use of the website including information provided by registering or by filling in forms on our site
Other information from your interaction with our website, services, content and advertising
Details of your visits to our website including traffic data, location data, weblogs, other communication data, and the resources that you access
If you contact us, we may keep a record of that correspondence

How we collect the information
We may collect information from you when you:

Apply for membership, including your contact details and professional information
Sign up for services or products, including courses and events
Sign up to receive communications from us
Respond to a survey or provide other forms of feedback
Interact with our website – we may automatically collect technical data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns

How we use your information
We use your information to:

Manage and maintain memberships and membership applications
Provide you with information, products or services that you request from us or which we feel may interest you
Ensure that content from our site is presented in the most effective manner for you
Facilitate educational activities and professional development
Support research and audit activities within the field of limb reconstruction
Comply with legal or regulatory obligations

How we may share the information
We may share some personal information with other parties, such as external contractors and our professional advisers in order to provide you with the benefits of your membership. Information will be anonymised where possible. The recipient of the information will be bound by confidentiality obligations. We may also be required to share some personal information with our regulators or as required to comply with the law.

Keeping your personal information secure
The BLRS takes the security of your data seriously. We have internal policies and controls in place to try to ensure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed, and is not accessed except by authorised personnel in the performance of their duties.
We limit access to your personal information to those who have a genuine business need to know it. Where the BLRS engages third parties to process personal data on its behalf, they do so on the basis of written instructions, are under a duty of confidentiality and are obliged to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure the security of data.

How long we keep your information
We will only keep your personally identifiable data for as long as we need to in order to fulfil our requirements (including legal, financial or reporting) or for our legitimate interests if they do not override yours.
There is some basic information that we need to retain for tax purposes for six years after you are no longer a member of the BLRS. This includes contact, financial and transactional data.

Your rights
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you have rights including:

Access and obtain a copy of your data on request
Require the BLRS to change incorrect or incomplete data
Require the BLRS to delete or stop processing your data, where appropriate
Object to the processing of your data where the BLRS is relying on its legitimate interests
Request restriction of processing of your personal data
Withdraw consent at any time where we are relying on consent to process your personal data

Contact Us
Please contact us if you would like to correct or request access to information that we hold relating to you or if you have any questions about this notice.
British Limb Reconstruction Society
c/o BOA Specialist Society Secretariat,
35-43 Lincoln’s Inn Fields,
London, WC2A 3PE

How to complain
If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data please contact us. If we cannot resolve your query or concern, you can contact the Information Commissioner at ico.org.uk/concerns/ or telephone: 0303 123 1113 for further information about your rights and how to make a formal complaint.