Accessibility Statement

This website is managed by the Corporate Communications Department of the Northern Health and Social Care Trust. Other Trust departments publish content on www.northerntrust.hscni.net.

How you should be able to use this website

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website.

You should be able to:

change colours, contrast levels and fonts using browser or device settings
zoom in up to 400% without the text spilling off the screen
navigate most of the website using a keyboard or speech recognition software
listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)

How accessible this website is

Parts of this website are not fully accessible. For example:

some pages and document attachments are not written in plain English
some tables do not have row or column headers
some documents may have poor colour contrast
some heading elements may not be consistent
some images in documents do not have image descriptions
some information in tables cannot be reached with a keyboard
some documents are in PDF format and may not be accessible

Some forms fields and labels may not be accessible

Each page has a ‘How can we improve this page’ link to report problems or issues with access.

Feedback and contact information

If you need information in a different format, please contact our Equality Unit.

Email: equality.unit@northerntrust.hscni.net
Telephone: 028 2766 1377

Please provide:

the web address (URL) of the content
your email address and name
the format you need – for example, plain text, braille, BSL, large print or audio CD

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

If you find any problems that are not listed on this page, or you think we’re not meeting the accessibility requirements, please contact the Corporate Communications Team at the Northern Health and Social Care Trust.

Email: corporate.communications@northerntrust.hscni.net
Telephone: 028 2563 3762

Enforcement procedure

The Equality Commission for Northern Ireland 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 Commission for Northern Ireland.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

The Northern Health and Social Care Trust is committed to making its websites accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard.

Non-accessible content

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

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Many documents are in non-HTML formats, for example PDF. They are not accessible in a number of ways including missing text alternatives and missing document structure.

The documents (PDFs) do not always have suitable image descriptions. Users of assistive technologies may not have access to information conveyed in images. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.1.1 (Non-text Content).
Tables in document (PDFs) may not have table row or column headers. This means assistive technologies will not read the tables correctly. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and Relationships).
Tables in documents (PDFs) may be structured incorrectly, so screen readers cannot understand the relationships between information in the table. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and Relationships).
Headings in documents (PDFs) may not display correctly. They may look like normal text or a different type of heading. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and Relationships).
Some images in documents (PDFs) may use colour as the only way to convey meaning. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.1 (Use of Colour).
Some pages in documents (PDFs) may use images of text instead of text. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.5 (Images of Text).
If a table is too wide to fit on the screen, the hidden information cannot be reached with a keyboard. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.1.1 (Keyboard).
Some web pages contain videos without a transcript. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.2.3 (Audio Description or Media Alternative).
There are visual grouping labels that are not associated with the relevant forms, which could be confusing to assistive technology users. This fails WCAG success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and relationships).

Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

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.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

We will work towards fixing content which fails to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standards.

We will identify and fix issues on a continual basis.

Some of this work will include:

working with other departments to fix documents which fail to meet WCAG 2.2 AA standards
publishing information in HTML (as a default)
reducing the use of PDFs on the site
providing text in the clearest and simplest language appropriate (WCAG success criterion 3.1.5 Reading level)
developing a clear and accessible site map to provide an alternative navigation for users, including those with visual, cognitive, or motor impairments

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 2 July 2026 and will be reviewed in October 2026.

The website was tested in April 2026 against the WCAG 2.2 AA standard. Testing of a sample of pages was carried out by the Business Services Organisation (BSO).

BSO used automated on-page accessibility tools (WAVE, Axe DevTools).

This is not a full comprehensive audit. We expect to do a full audit to find any other accessibility issues.

We also used findings from our own testing when preparing this accessibility statement.

Last updated 2 July 2026.