Hushtag for clinics and allied health · St. Albert, Edmonton and across Alberta

AI for clinic paperwork. Patients stay in the clinic.

Physiotherapists, chiropractors, optometrists, dietitians and clinic staff use ChatGPT for progress notes, home programs, insurer letters and patient emails. Hushtag swaps patient names, birth dates, health card numbers and phone numbers for hashtags on each computer before the AI sees them, then restores them in the answer.

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physio-note.txt
Client: Daniel Okafor#PERSON_1, DOB 1974-02-17#BIRTHDATE_1, PHN 12345-6789#HEALTH_ID_1 Phone: (780) 555-0193#PHONE_1 Referred by Dr. Patel#PERSON_2 Initial assessment June 3, 2025: L shoulder pain 6/10, reduced flexion. Write a progress note and a home exercise summary for the client.
Highlighted details never leave your device.
What your team uses AI for

Same AI tools. No identities.

Progress and discharge notes

Tidy up your own notes into a clear summary.

Home exercise and diet plans

Plain-language instructions the patient can follow.

Insurer and WCB letters

Draft the letter from the file details.

Patient emails

Clear replies about appointments, forms and next steps.

Hushtag catches: Patient names · birth dates · Alberta health card (AHCIP/PHN/ULI) numbers · insurance and claim numbers · phone numbers · addresses · email addresses. Add your own client or patient list so every name is always hushed.

The rules you work under

Alberta privacy law, in plain words.

Regulated members of many Alberta health colleges are custodians under the Health Information Act (HIA), including physicians, physiotherapists, chiropractors, optometrists, opticians, dietitians, pharmacists, podiatrists, midwives and registered nurses. Custodians must protect health information with reasonable safeguards and report breaches where there is a risk of harm.

Not on that list (for example, some massage or counselling practices)? Alberta's Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) likely applies to the personal information you hold instead. Either way, Hushtag keeps identifying details on your computer; it doesn't make a clinic compliant on its own.

AI-safe office in a day · Alberta HIA practical checklist

Using AI in a clinic without putting patients in the prompt.

1. Are you a custodian?

Most likely, if you're a regulated member of one of the colleges designated in the Health Information (Ministerial) Regulation, which as of 2026 include the colleges for physicians and surgeons, physiotherapists, chiropractors, optometrists, opticians, dietitians, pharmacy, podiatric physicians, midwives, registered nurses, dental surgeons, dental hygienists and denturists (regulation; Alberta.ca). If you're not a custodian, PIPA usually covers the personal information you hold, and the steps below still apply.

Your front-desk, clinical and admin staff are affiliates under the HIA. The custodian stays responsible for how affiliates handle health information, including what they paste into an AI chat (Alberta.ca).

2. Why patient details in AI chats are a risk

  • It's a disclosure to an outside company. A consumer AI chat is a service run by another company, usually outside Canada. The OIPC's guidance for small custodians says Alberta's privacy laws apply when AI systems process health information, and asks you to check whether the provider uses data for purposes you may not have authority for, such as training its models (OIPC guidance).
  • New systems need a privacy impact assessment. Under section 64 of the HIA, custodians submit a PIA to the OIPC before implementing a new system or practice that collects, uses or discloses identifying health information (PIA guide). The OIPC has published specific PIA guidance for AI scribes (AI scribe guidance).
  • Breaches must be reported. If health information is lost or disclosed without authority and there is a risk of harm, the HIA requires notice to the affected people, the Information and Privacy Commissioner and the Minister (Alberta.ca, OIPC).
  • Regulators have looked at ChatGPT. Canada's privacy commissioners, including Alberta's, concluded the initial development of ChatGPT did not comply with privacy laws (joint report).

3. The steps (most offices can do them in a day)

  1. Policy (20 minutes). Adopt a one-page staff AI-use policy: what never goes into AI, de-identify first, who to tell if something slips. Free fillable template (Word/PDF).
  2. Tool (10 minutes per computer). Install a de-identification step so names, birth dates, health card and insurance numbers are replaced before text reaches the AI. Hushtag does this on each computer and restores the details in the answer. Lock the settings with a manager PIN so protection stays on.
  3. Staff training (15 minutes). Walk everyone through the policy and one real example: paste a sample letter, look at what was hidden, restore the answer. Have everyone sign.
  4. Record (ongoing). Keep a record that the safeguard is used. Hushtag's AI-use record lists the date, AI site and how many details of each kind were hidden on each computer, never the text itself. Download it monthly and keep it with the signed policy.
  5. Breach plan (10 minutes). Name the person who decides whether an incident is a reportable breach, and bookmark the OIPC breach notification page.
  6. Check with your privacy officer or college whether your planned AI use needs a PIA or other steps. This checklist is a starting point, not legal advice.

What this does and doesn't do. De-identifying before you paste reduces what reaches an AI company. It doesn't make an office HIA-compliant on its own, doesn't replace a PIA where one is required, and doesn't cover text staff type by hand without pasting, or files uploaded directly to an AI tool.

Sources

Links checked October 18, 2026. Laws and guidance change; follow the official versions.

The AI-safe office package

Everything above, set up for your office.

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How it works

Hush, ask, restore.

  1. Paste as usualThe Chrome extension hushes details the moment text is pasted into ChatGPT, Copilot, Claude or Gemini in the browser. For PDFs, scans, Word and Excel, the web app makes a hushed copy in your browser.
  2. The AI works with hashtagsThe same person always gets the same hashtag, so letters and summaries still make sense.
  3. Real details go back inOne shortcut restores names and numbers in the answer, on your screen only.
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