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Help Clinic

Accessibility Statement

Last updated: 27 April 2026.

Help Clinic is built with people in mind. We believe access to mental-health information should be real for everyone — regardless of vision, hearing, mobility or cognitive limitations. This document describes how well our site meets accessibility standards and what we are doing to improve.

1. Our commitment

Help Clinic aims to comply with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 at level AA — the international standard for building websites that work for people with diverse disabilities. We also align with the European Accessibility Act (EAA), in force from 28 June 2025.

2. Conformance status

The Help Clinic website is partially conformant with WCAG 2.1 AA. We are working towards full conformance — known limitations are listed below. We prefer to be honest rather than promise more than we can deliver today.

3. What already works

  • Semantic HTML — proper headings, lists and landmark regions, so screen readers can navigate efficiently.
  • Colour contrast — our palette is designed for a minimum contrast ratio of 4.5:1 for normal text.
  • Keyboard navigation — all key elements (links, forms, buttons) are reachable from the keyboard, with a visible focus indicator.
  • Skip link — first tab reveals a "Skip to content" link.
  • Four languages — interface and content available in Polish, English, German and Spanish, with the correct lang attribute.
  • Responsive design — adapts to mobile devices and supports 200% zoom without loss of functionality.
  • Forms — fields have labels; error messages are descriptive.

4. Known limitations

To be honest, there is still room to grow:

  • Alt text on some images may be too generic or empty — particularly in older articles. We are running a systematic audit and adding meaningful descriptions.
  • Some interactive components (sliders, accordions) may not yet implement the full keyboard pattern recommended by WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices.
  • PDFs and downloadable assets may not always be fully accessible to screen readers. Where possible, we provide an HTML alternative.
  • Video — when we publish video, some clips may not yet have captions or audio description. We are addressing this for new content.
  • Psychological tests — the test interface is intentionally simple but has not yet been formally tested with users who rely on assistive technologies.

5. Supported technologies

The site has been tested with the following set-ups:

  • Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge — latest stable versions.
  • NVDA + Firefox (Windows), VoiceOver + Safari (macOS, iOS) — spot-check testing.
  • Browser zoom up to 200%, Windows forced contrast.

6. Reporting an accessibility issue

If you encounter a barrier — even a small one — please tell us. Every report helps us improve the site for the next person.

Helpful information to include:

  • the URL where the issue occurred;
  • a short description of the barrier;
  • your browser and assistive technology, if any.

We respond within 14 business days. If a fix takes longer, we will say so and give a realistic timeline.

7. Enforcement

If you find our response insufficient, you may contact the competent authority — in Poland, the Polish Commissioner for Human Rights (brpo.gov.pl) — or the equivalent body designated under your national EAA implementation.

8. What's next

We are working on:

  • a full audit of alt text across all images;
  • captions and transcripts for all video content;
  • full WCAG 2.2 AA conformance once it becomes the industry standard;
  • user testing with people who use assistive technology.

9. About this statement

This statement was prepared as a self-assessment by the Help Clinic team. We update it at least once a year and after significant changes to the site.