The CCN Website relies on contributions - your experiences and knowledge are invaluable and help others who are dealing with similar or related issues. Please contribute as many articles as you can, whether it is just a brief comment on a terrific toy you've found or comments on articles already on the site, to your family's personal experience (see below for guidelines on submitting personal material), to technical articles about the medical and social aspects of childhood cataracts

We do our best to make sure that there aren’t mistakes on the website, but obviously we get things wrong sometimes. Please let us know and we’ll put it right.

Please note that all material submitted may be edited by the CCN team

Personal Stories

We welcome your personal stories about your experiences of childhood cataracts. These stories really do help other families going through the same thing. Please write about anything you want to.  These do not need to be ‘vetted’ by a professional

Your privacy and security are our priority. Therefore, please avoid giving details that might make you and your family easy to identify. We welcome personal stories and accounts, but we ask contributors to change their names and those of their families (i.e. post submissions using a made-up name rather than your real name) and to use first names only. Where we feel that a contributor's identity is only thinly disguised, the CCN reserves the right to change names on your behalf. We hope you understand the reasons for this policy.

Information/ technical articles

It’s crucial that people can rely on the information on our website being as accurate as possible. If your piece contains medical or technical information (for example information about benefits), and you are not a qualified expert, it will need to be vetted by an ophthalmologist or another suitable specialist (such as a professional benefits advisor) before it goes on the website. If you can arrange for your article to be 'vetted' by a suitable professional, you are welcome to do so; please provide their name and contact details. Otherwise you can submit your article and we will arrange for it to be checked by a relevant qualified professional. Please note that if necessary we may change part(s) of your article. We will always publish the name of the professional who has checked that the factual information is correct.

We use US English rather than British English spellings for medical terminology, as just about all modern medical literature follows this convention and it makes articles are easier for search engines to find. We use Birtish terminology and spellings for everything else.

If your piece does not contain any personal information, it is up to you whether you use your real name as the author, or anonymously or under a made-up name

We also welcome material from professionals about their area of expertise; these need to have the author’s name, qualification/ position and work contact address.

All submissions

Some information can get out of date (especially about medical and legal issues) and may not get updated as soon as it should be. Please note that all articles submitted must be dated, as we need to publish the date each article was written, and the date it was last updated.

We will not publish pictures in which individual children can be identified (also to protect privacy)

The CCN will not tolerate criticism, stated or implied, of any identifiable individuals, including medical professionals, health workers, education professionals etc

This is a UK based group – we’re happy to have material from anyone, anywhere but it needs to be relevant to a UK audience

We will not publish anything that will bring the CCN into disrepute

Please make your English clear and easy to understand

Author: CCN
Last updated: 26/02/08