Privacy Policy

Health Garage respects your privacy. We collect and hold personal information — including, for our patients, health information — and we are responsible for protecting it. This policy explains, in plain language, what we collect, why, how we use and share it, how we keep it safe, and the rights you have over your own information. If anything here is unclear, our Privacy Officer is glad to help; contact details are at the end.

1. About Health Garage

Health Garage is a family medical practice owned and operated by Dr. Rehana Ahmed. In the same premises we also offer fitness services — one-to-one personal training during clinic hours, and group gym classes outside clinic hours that are open to the public. These are two different services with different rules, so this policy has a dedicated section for each. Wherever you interact with us, one Privacy Officer is accountable for your information.

2. The personal information we collect

If you are a patient of the clinic

To provide medical care and bill for insured services, we collect information such as:

• Your name, date of birth, address, phone and email, and your Personal Health Number (PHN).
• Your emergency contact.
• Your health information — your history, symptoms, examination findings, diagnoses, medications and allergies, test and imaging results, referrals, immunizations, and our notes of your care.
• Information others send us about your care, such as consultant letters and lab results.
• Records of your appointments and your communications with us.

If you take part in personal training or a gym class

To deliver fitness services safely, and separately from the clinic, we collect:

• Your name and contact details.
• A pre-exercise health screening (for example a PAR-Q) and any injuries, limitations or goals you choose to share, so we can train you safely.
• For personal training, your fitness assessments and session notes.
• For gym classes, your class registration, waiver, and attendance.

This fitness information is kept separate from any clinical record. See section 6.

Payment information

When you pay for an uninsured service, personal training or a class, our payment processor handles your card details. We keep a record of the transaction (amount, date, receipt) but we do not store your full card number.

When you use our website

Our website (healthgarage.ca) collects only what you choose to send us through a form or booking request. It does not use cookies, analytics or tracking. How we handle website information is set out in our separate Website Privacy Policy.

If you work for us

We handle employee and contractor information under a separate arrangement and on a different legal basis; it is not covered by this patient- and client-facing policy.

3. Why we collect your information

We collect, use and disclose personal information only for purposes a reasonable person would consider appropriate, namely to:

• Provide, coordinate and document your medical care.
• Bill the Medical Services Plan for insured services, and take payment for uninsured ones.
• Deliver personal-training and gym-class services safely.
• Communicate with you — appointments, reminders, results and follow-up.
• Run, manage and improve our practice, and meet our legal and professional obligations.

4. Consent

Your clinical care. When you come to us as a patient, we rely on your implied consent to collect, use and share your health information for your care among the professionals involved in it — your “circle of care.” Some uses and disclosures need your express consent, which we will ask for — for example, releasing your records to an insurer, a lawyer, or an employer, or sharing information with your personal trainer (see section 6).

Your fitness services. For personal training and gym classes we rely on your express consent, which you give when you sign up. We will tell you what we collect and who will see it before you decide.

Withdrawing consent. You may withdraw your consent at any time, subject to legal or professional limits and reasonable notice. We will explain what withdrawing consent means — for example, there may be care we can no longer safely provide. Withdrawing consent does not apply retroactively to things already done, or to records we are required to keep.

5. How we use and share your information

Within your care team. We share your health information with the professionals involved in your care, only as needed to provide it.

For the clinic, we may share information with:

• Health Insurance BC, to bill the Medical Services Plan (your PHN and service and diagnostic codes).
• PharmaNet, to check and record your medications (access is logged and audited provincially).
• Laboratories, imaging providers and the consultants we refer you to.
• Your pharmacy, when we prescribe.

When the law requires or permits it. We may disclose information without your consent where the law requires or allows it — for example, public-health reporting, a court order or subpoena, or to prevent a serious and immediate risk of harm. We disclose only what is necessary.

We do not sell your information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

6. Keeping the clinic and the fitness studio separate

7. Service providers and where your information is kept

We use trusted service providers to run our practice — including our electronic medical record, our booking and reminder system, and our payment processor. We require each of them to protect your information and to use it only for the services they provide to us.

Your information is kept in Canada, with one exception. Our medical record system, our booking and reminder system, and our website all store your information in Canada. The exception is payments: our payment processor, Stripe, processes payment information outside Canada, where it may be accessible to authorities there under their laws. If you have questions about our service providers or where your information is stored, contact our Privacy Officer.

8. How we protect your information

We take reasonable steps to protect your information against loss, theft, and unauthorized access, including:

• Administrative measures — confidentiality agreements, staff training, and access limited to those who need it for their role.
• Technical measures — unique logins, passwords and multi-factor authentication, encryption, and audit logs that record who accesses records.
• Physical measures — locked storage, a clean-desk practice, and — because the gym operates outside clinic hours — securing the clinical area, records and workstations whenever the clinic is closed.

If a privacy breach ever occurs, we follow a written breach-response procedure: we contain it, assess the risk, notify you when notification would help you avoid or reduce harm, and take steps to prevent it happening again.

9. How long we keep your information

We keep your information only as long as needed for the purpose we collected it, and as required by law and professional standards. Medical records are kept for the minimum period set by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of BC — generally at least sixteen years from your last visit, or from the age of majority for a child. Billing and payment records are kept as tax law requires. When information is no longer needed, we destroy it securely.

10. Your rights: seeing and correcting your information

You have the right to ask for access to the personal information we hold about you, and to ask us to correct it if it is wrong or incomplete. To make a request, contact our Privacy Officer. We will respond within the time PIPA allows (generally about 30 business days), and we will let you know if a minimal fee applies for copying a larger record. In limited cases the law allows us to withhold certain information; if that happens, we will explain why.

11. Questions, concerns and complaints

If you have a question or concern about your privacy, please contact our Privacy Officer first — we would like the chance to make it right. You also have the right to complain to:

Information & Privacy Commissioner for BC (OIPC)

(250) 387-5629 · info@oipc.bc.ca · oipc.bc.ca

College of Physicians and Surgeons of BC

(604) 733-7758 · Toll-free in BC 1-800-461-3008 · cpsbc.ca

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as our practice or the law changes. The current version is always available at reception and on our website at healthgarage.ca. The effective date appears at the top.

Contact us

Looking for how we handle information collected through this website? See our Website Privacy Policy.