Hushtag for dental offices · St. Albert, Edmonton and across Alberta
Front desk and clinical staff already use ChatGPT for referral letters, treatment explanations and insurance appeals. Hushtag swaps patient names, birth dates, Alberta health card and insurance numbers for hashtags on each computer before the AI sees them, puts the real details back in the answer, and keeps a record you can file. Below: a practical HIA checklist with official sources.
Turn chart notes into a clear letter to the specialist.
Plain-language summaries of a treatment plan the patient can take home.
Draft the letter from the claim details.
Friendlier wording for reminders and instructions.
Hushtag catches: Patient names · birth dates · Alberta health card (AHCIP/PHN) numbers · insurance and member IDs · phone numbers · addresses · email addresses. Add your own client or patient list so every name is always hushed.
Dentists, dental hygienists and denturists in Alberta are custodians under the Health Information Act (HIA). Custodians must protect health information with reasonable safeguards, submit privacy impact assessments for new systems that handle identifying health information, and report breaches where there is a risk of harm.
A consumer AI chat is an outside company, usually outside Canada. Hushtag keeps identifying details on your computer so they don't go out in the first place. It doesn't make your office HIA-compliant on its own. The checklist below walks through the rest.
Yes, if you're a regulated member of the College of Dental Surgeons of Alberta, the Alberta College of Dental Hygienists or the College of Alberta Denturists: the Health Information (Ministerial) Regulation designates regulated members of these colleges as custodians (regulation). The CDSA's privacy standard of practice also expects a dentist acting as custodian to have privacy policies and procedures, safeguards, and PIAs where the HIA requires them (CDSA standard).
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).
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.
Links checked October 18, 2026. Laws and guidance change; follow the official versions.