Accessibility Statement

This accessibility statement applies to https://www.eurostemcell.org. This website is run by the University of Edinburgh. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. That means you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver
  • we’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.



AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

The University of Edinburgh has advice on customising a website to make it easier to read and navigate.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible.

  • some parts may not be fully compatible with screen readers;
  • some parts may require assistive technologies to adjust readability;
  • some of our online forms and content filters are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard;
  • not all media will have a transcript or be subtitled;
  • some older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software.

Feedback and contact information

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille, contact us via our contact form or email enquiries [at] eurostemcell [dot] org.

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please report a problem on our contact form or email enquiries [at] eurostemcell [dot] org.

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) 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 Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

The government has produced information on how to report accessibility issues:

Reporting an accessibility problem on a public sector website

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Eurostemcell is committed to making its website 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 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.

Non-accessible content

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

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

  • https://www.eurostemcell.org/contact - The contact page is not fully accessible because a keyboard user is unable to navigate through the entirety of the form. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 2.1.1 - Keyboard.
  • The homepage and other pages on the site have issues highlighted around colour contrast, which may affect some users from accessing the content on the site. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 1.4.3 – Contrast (Minimum).
  • In the header of the page, using the tab key on the keyboard or other assistive technologies, the drop down filters for; Theme, Condition and Type in the header of the site may not be accessible for some users.
  • Some pages have content that is not structured in an ideal flow that aids disabled users, some content may skip a heading level, e.g. use a heading 1 followed by a heading 3 instead of a heading 2. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 1.3.1 – Info and Relationships and 1.3.2 – Meaningful Sequence.
  • There are a small number of places where the alternative text for an image is similar to nearby or adjacent text on the page. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 1.1.1 Non-text Content.
  • Some pages contain phrases such as “Read more”, which can be confusing to users of assistive technologies, as to which section the phrase is related to. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 2.4.4 Link Purpose (In Context).
  • The interactive elements of the contact form are not fully keyboard focusable. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 2.1.1 – Keyboard, 2.4.7 – Focus Visible and 2.4.3 – Focus Order.
  • Missing ability for users to change; colours, contrast levels and fonts as appropriate natively within the website without assistance from assistive technologies. This relates to the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 2.1.1 – Keyboard, 2.4.7 – Focus Visible and 2.4.3 – Focus Order 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value.
  • Missing ability to change font size, other than using assistive technologies including zoom built in to most browsers. This fails the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria for criterion 1.4.4 Resize text.

Disproportionate burden

We are not currently claiming that any accessibility problems would be a disproportionate burden to fix.

Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

PDFs and other documents - Our PDFs and Word documents are not essential to providing our services. 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 as the text recreated in the PDF is duplicated in HTML. Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

Pre-recorded time based media published before 23rd September 2020 is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations. New media developed by EuroStemCell will meet accessibility standards.

The partner location map is not intended for navigational use.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

We plan to review the identified issues listed above in January 2021 in partnership with our web developing partners, Upbeat Productions, with the aim to address as many as possible as part of a planned round of Drupal front-end redevelopment and deployment throughout the site. It is estimated that this update will be completed by May 2021. It must be noted that this roadmap for redeveloping the accessibility capabilities of the site is reliant on funding contributions to be secured by November 2020.

All new content including images from September 9th, 2020 will be published in line with W3C accessibility criteria. 

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 8th September 2020. It was last reviewed on 9th September 2020.

This website was last tested on 8th September 2020. The test was carried out by Alan Saunders from Upbeat Productions using both manual and automated review using Google Developer Tools with Chrome (Lighthouse) and WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool. We tested the major landing pages and node types alongside the W3C Accessibility guidelines.