Website of a healthcare professional: what you have the right to do (and not to do)

For more than seventy years, the communication of health professionals in France has been governed by a simple principle: “medicine should not be practiced as a business. » All forms of advertising were prohibited. Since the end of 2020, the situation has changed: practitioners can now communicate online, including via a website. But this freedom remains strictly regulated — and the line between authorized information and prohibited promotion remains subtle.

Here is what a healthcare professional can, and cannot, do on their site in 2026.

Disclaimer. This article is for informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Regulations evolve and are assessed on a case-by-case basis; have your project validated by your professional order or a specialized council.

The turning point dates from Decree No. 2020-1662 of December 22, 2020, which modified the code of ethics and removed the general ban on advertising inherited from 1947. This development was imposed in particular to bring French law into compliance with European law.

Concretely, the practitioner is now free to communicate to the public, by any means - including a website - information likely to contribute to the patient's free choice of practitioner: their skills, their professional practices, their background and the conditions of their practice. The relaxation concerns several professions, including doctors, dental surgeons, chiropodists-podiatrists, nurses, midwives and masseurs-physiotherapists.

In other words: yes, a health professional can have a real informative site and present his activity. But “informing” is not “trading,” and that’s where the rules come into play.

You can present your complete professional identity: qualifications, diplomas, specialties, background, and clearly identify yourself as a practitioner. You can describe your practices and the organization of your exercise: schedules, appointment scheduling, office accessibility, languages spoken, means of payment, prices and agreements.

You can also disseminate, for educational or public health purposes, scientifically supported information about your discipline — provided you do so with caution and moderation, by dating and sourcing your content, and without presenting unconfirmed hypotheses as granted. This educational dimension is, moreover, excellent for SEO: rigorous content that answers patients' questions is precisely what the engines are looking for.

The framework sets clear limits. Communication must remain loyal and honest. In particular, testimonials from patients or third parties, comparisons with other practitioners or establishments, and any incitement to unnecessary recourse to acts of prevention or care are prohibited.

More broadly, anything that comes under commercial promotion — laudatory speeches, flashy promotion, advertising language praising superiority — remains contrary to ethics. The spirit of the text remains: informing the patient to inform their choice, without transforming care into a marketing argument.

Since 2020, several clarifications have been added to strengthen the framework, particularly around the digital universe.

The rigor of information is required, with increased “necessary precaution” in communicating to the public, particularly on platforms. Transparency on conflicts of interest is essential: any funding or partnership likely to influence public medical discourse must be declared. Finally, professional secrecy and confidentiality of patient data are extended to digital communications — a major issue with the rise of teleconsultation and online exchanges, which requires technically secure sites that comply with the GDPR.

The National Council of the Order of Physicians also published, at the beginning of 2025, a charter establishing principles for responsible online communication (identifying yourself clearly, providing sourced and dated information, exercising caution and moderation, avoiding self-promotion). These recommendations serve as a compass, particularly for practitioners present on social networks.

Compliance is not the enemy of efficiency — quite the contrary. A site that respects ethics is also a sober, clear and useful site, exactly what patients and search engines expect.

In practice, a good health professional site combines several ingredients: a clear and factual presentation of the practitioner and the practice, frictionless practical information (online appointments, access, schedules), reliable educational content on the discipline, hosting and data management compliant with the GDPR (ideally suitable health data hosting when required), and real technical performance (speed, mobile, accessibility). Added to this is careful local referencing, because a patient is first and foremost looking for a practitioner near him.

It’s this balance between regulatory rigor and user experience that makes the difference — and this is precisely what we design at Reqst for healthcare stakeholders.

Since 2020, a healthcare professional can communicate online and have a real site: present their background, their skills, the conditions of their practice and reliable educational content. But this communication must remain loyal, without testimonials, without comparisons, without incitement or commercial language, and respect reinforced obligations of transparency and confidentiality. Well conducted, it serves both the patient, the ethics and the visibility of the practitioner.

Are you a practitioner or healthcare structure and want a site that is both compliant and efficient? Present us your project or book a call — we design health sites combining regulatory rigor and patient experience.