# What a private practice website needs > The pages and elements a UK private practice website needs, from the legal block and privacy notice to the doctor’s page, and why each one is there. Source: https://www.nodsites.com/blog/what-a-private-practice-website-needs/ Updated: 2026-10-12 Design The pages and elements a UK private practice website needs, from the legal block and privacy notice to the doctor’s page, and why each one is there. NodsitesPublished 29 September 20266 min read A private practice website needs a short list of pages a patient looks for, and a few elements that belong on every one of them: who runs the practice, who regulates it, how personal data is handled, and when the information was last checked. Part of the list comes from what patients do on a phone; the rest from company law, the regulators and the Information Commissioner. This is the list for a UK practice, with the reason for each item. **Key points** - Every page carries the company details, the regulator and a dated last-updated line. - A privacy notice and a cookie choice are legal requirements. - Each service has its own plain page; each doctor a page with qualifications and the register entry. - Contact, hours and address work one-handed on a phone; a complaints route is a regulation. - Accessibility, speed and structured data are properties of every page, not pages. ## The pages a patient looks for A patient arrives with questions: do you do this, who will I see, what will it be like, where are you, how do I get in touch. The pages answer them in that order. - A home page that says in one line what the practice does and where. - One page per service, written so a patient knows what to expect; see the post on [writing a treatment page patients understand](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/writing-a-treatment-page-patients-understand/). - A page for each doctor or clinician. - A contact page with the address, the hours and every way to reach you. - An about page: the practice, the team, the premises. - A privacy notice, a complaints page and the terms, reachable from the foot of every page. How these are arranged so that a patient finds them without thinking is the [design of the site](https://www.nodsites.com/medical-website-design/#bespoke-design), decided before any page is written. ## What every page carries: the legal block and the date A limited company must show its registered name, registered number, place of registration and registered office address on its website. On a practice website this sits in a block at the foot of every page, next to the regulator: CQC for a clinic in England, GDC for a dental practice. A patient should not have to guess who is behind a site that asks for health details. The same block carries a dated last-updated line. The GDC asks a dental practice website to show the date it was last updated and to keep its information current; the GMC asks doctors to take reasonable steps to check that what they communicate is accurate. A date is the plainest evidence of that checking. ## A privacy notice and a cookie choice A practice website collects personal data the moment someone fills in a form, and health details are special category data. The ICO lists what a privacy notice must say: who you are, why you use the data and on what lawful basis, who you share it with, how long you keep it, people’s rights, and that they can complain to the ICO. Cookies are a separate rule: those that are not strictly necessary, analytics included, need consent before they are set, and consent is a clear positive action, which carrying on reading is not. That means a banner with a real choice, and a site that works fully when the visitor declines. The post on [privacy and cookies on a practice website](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/privacy-and-cookies-on-a-practice-website/) goes through both. ## The doctor’s page: qualifications and the register entry Patients check: the qualifications, where they come from, and the register entry. The GDC asks that a dental professional named on a practice website shows their qualification, the country it comes from and their GDC registration number; for a doctor, the GMC number and a link to the GMC register do the same job. Good medical practice applies to everything a doctor publishes about their services: accurate, not misleading, nothing relevant left out, no opinion presented as established fact. The page is written to that standard, and so is anything patients have said on it; the post on [patient reviews on a medical website](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/patient-reviews-on-a-medical-website/) explains what can and cannot be shown. ## Contact, hours, address, and how to complain Many patients first meet a practice on a phone held in one hand. So the phone number is a link that dials; the address opens a map; the hours are text, not an image, and each location has its own; the form asks for what an enquiry needs and confirms that the message went through. The post on [checking your practice website from your phone](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/check-your-practice-website-on-a-phone/) tests all of this in ten minutes. The same page says how to complain. CQC Regulation 16 requires an accessible system for receiving and handling complaints, and that people are told how to take one further if they are not satisfied; the GDC lists the complaints procedure among what a dental website must display. A short paragraph, a named role and an address are enough. ## Accessibility and speed are properties, not pages An accessible website is not an accessibility page. It is every page working for an older patient, an anxious one, one on a small phone or a screen reader. WCAG 2.2 is the standard: text contrast of at least 4.5:1, text that reflows when enlarged, keyboard access with a visible focus, images with a text alternative, forms with labels and clear error messages, targets large enough to tap. The post on [an accessible practice website, in plain words](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/an-accessible-practice-website/) takes each in turn. Speed is the same kind of property: a page that stays blank for seconds on mobile data loses the patient who is pressed for time, usually because of large photographs and scripts that load before the text. ## Structured data, so machines read the practice correctly Search engines and AI assistants read a practice website too, and read it better when the page states in a standard format what it contains: name, address, hours, services, doctors and their qualifications. Google calls this structured data and recommends the JSON-LD format, which sits inside the page without changing what a patient sees. It lets a search result show the opening hours, and an assistant answer a question about them from the practice’s own page. The post on [Google Business Profile for a clinic](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/google-business-profile-for-a-clinic/) covers the listing beside the website. ## Common questions ### Does a small practice need all of this? Yes, because none of it depends on size: the company details, the privacy notice, the cookie choice and the complaints route apply to a one-room practice as to a hospital group. What grows is the number of treatment and doctor pages. ### Can the legal block sit on one page instead of every page? The rule says the details must be on the website, not where. On every page, a patient who lands on a treatment page from a search sees them at once, and the regulator and the date belong beside them. ### Who writes the treatment pages? The clinical facts come from the doctor; the writing is the job of whoever is responsible for the website, with the doctor checking the result. The GMC and GDC standards apply to what is published, whoever typed it. This is part of the design work on every website we look after. ## References 1. Running a limited company: signs, stationery and promotional material, GOV.UK — [gov.uk](https://www.gov.uk/running-a-limited-company/signs-stationery-and-promotional-material) · Accessed 2026-10-11 2. Regulation 16: Receiving and acting on complaints, Care Quality Commission — [cqc.org.uk](https://www.cqc.org.uk/guidance-providers/regulations/regulation-16-receiving-acting-complaints) · Accessed 2026-10-11 3. Good medical practice, Domain 4: Trust and professionalism, General Medical Council (2024) — [gmc-uk.org](https://www.gmc-uk.org/professional-standards/the-professional-standards/good-medical-practice/domain-4-trust-and-professionalism) · Accessed 2026-10-11 4. Guidance on advertising, General Dental Council — [gdc-uk.org](https://www.gdc-uk.org/standards-guidance/standards-and-guidance/gdc-guidance-for-dental-professionals/guidance-on-advertising) · Accessed 2026-10-11 5. What privacy information should we provide?, Information Commissioner's Office — [ico.org.uk](https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/individual-rights/the-right-to-be-informed/what-privacy-information-should-we-provide/) · Accessed 2026-10-11 6. Cookies and similar technologies, Information Commissioner's Office — [ico.org.uk](https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/direct-marketing-and-privacy-and-electronic-communications/guide-to-pecr/cookies-and-similar-technologies/) · Accessed 2026-10-11 7. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, W3C (2024) — [w3.org](https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG22/) · Accessed 2026-10-11 8. Introduction to structured data markup in Google Search, Google Search Central — [developers.google.com](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/appearance/structured-data/intro-structured-data) · Accessed 2026-10-11 ## Related posts [All posts](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/) - Design ### [Check your practice website from your phone](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/check-your-practice-website-on-a-phone/) Seven checks any doctor can make on their own phone in ten minutes, to see the practice website as patients first meet it, and what to fix afterwards. 26 September 20266 min read - Rules ### [Advertising licence for a UAE clinic website](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/advertising-licence-for-a-uae-clinic-website/) A UAE clinic website is healthcare advertising: the MOHAP licence, the emirate’s approval, Arabic, what is barred, and keeping health data in the UAE. 11 October 20266 min read - Rules ### [A clinic website in Türkiye: one site or two?](https://www.nodsites.com/blog/clinic-website-in-turkiye-one-site-or-two/) Patients in Türkiye may be informed, not advertised to; a health-tourism authorisation allows promotion abroad on a separate site. Where the line sits. 9 October 20266 min read Ready when you are ## Your website, without the project Tell us about your practice in one short form. We read it the same working day, reply within one working day, and if it looks like a match we book the call around your clinic hours. [Start Your Project](https://www.nodsites.com/enquire/)[Our Process](https://www.nodsites.com/process/)