County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This accessibility statement applies to: www.cddft.nhs.uk

We want to make sure our website is as accessible as it can be. Therefore, you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader
  • access the website using a mobile or tablet

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Non-accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons;

Non-compliance with accessibility regulations

We’ve tried to make the website text as easy as possible to understand, however we know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

  • Some of our PDF, images, Microsoft Word documents and Microsoft PowerPoint documents do not meet the required accessibility standards.
  • Some of our PDFs and Microsoft Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on that users will find useful when accessing our services, and forms published as PDFs and Microsoft Word documents. We are planning to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.
  • Some images feature information that is not accessible, e.g. infographics. We are aware of these and are working through them with relevant services to produce alternatives that present the information in an accessible way.
  • Some of our videos do not include transcripts or subtitles

These documents do not meet the following success criterion:

  • 1.3.1 Info and relationships
  • 1.4.3 Contrast (Minimum)
  • 1.4.5 Images of text
  • 1.4.12 Text spacing
  • 2.4.6 Headings and labels

Some videos across the site are without any captions and transcripts. However, we’re in the process of going through our video clips and are working on a plan to fix these. In the meantime, we have included the option of having captions on through YouTube, and are including transcripts where we can.

  • 1.1.1 Non-text content
  • 1.2.2 Captions (Pre-recorded)
  • 1.2.5 Audio Descriptions (Pre-recorded)

Disproportionate burden assessment

We've assessed that it would be a disproportionate burden to fix all documents published on the website. The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

A number of these documents are rarely viewed, therefore they are unlikely to negatively impact users with disabilities or impairments. For this reason, we don't believe the cost of time and resource to fix all the documents is justified. We will focus on fixing those which are essential to providing our services.

We believe that the resources and nature of our organisation mean that there are limited public resources available which must be managed appropriately and in the public interest to prioritise the delivery of essential services to the public. We believe that fixing all documents on our website would impose a disproportionate burden on us.

Feedback and contact information

We’re always aiming to improve the accessibility of this website. If you experience any problems not listed on this page, or if you need information on this website in a different format please email: cdda-tr.communications@nhs.net

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Carrying out accessibility checks

We will carry out checks of our website, which will include:

  • testing using accessibility monitoring software
  • manual testing carried out by the team responsible for the website

We will check samples of content, which may include:

  • the homepage
  • content pages that are mostly text-based
  • images, video and audio content
  • PDFs and other document types
  • dynamic content like pop-up windows
  • navigation pages, including their sitemap and pages with search functionality

Preparation of this accessibility statement

The statement was prepared on 27/11/2024 and was last reviewed / updated on 15/01/2025.