Privacy Policy

Overview

ERview Sarnia is a community-powered app that shows an estimated wait time at the Bluewater Health emergency department in Sarnia, Ontario. It is built and operated by IThero Solutions (Sarnia, Ontario, Canada). ERview Sarnia is an independent project and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Bluewater Health.

The app is designed with privacy first. We do not collect your name, email, phone number, or any information about your health, symptoms, or medical condition.

What We Collect

When you submit a wait time report, we store:

• A scrambled app identifier. The first time you use the app it creates a random ID and keeps it on your phone. We store only a scrambled (hashed) version of that ID. It is not your phone's hardware ID or advertising ID, and it is used only to limit repeat reports within an 8-hour window.
• Timestamps. The times you tap "arrived," "triaged," and "seeing a doctor." These are used only to calculate how long the wait was.
• A location check result. A yes/no value showing whether your phone was within 300 metres of the hospital when you tapped. Your GPS coordinates never leave your phone.
• A repeat-visit flag. Whether this is a second report from the same app within 8 hours, so repeat reports count for less.

Individual reports are automatically deleted about 12 hours after they are submitted. Only an anonymous summary (for example, "estimated wait: 42 minutes, 8 reports") is kept, and it is recalculated every 5 minutes.

What We Do Not Collect

Location

The app may ask for your location only while you are using it, to check on your phone whether you are near the emergency department. This helps show which reports come from people who are actually there.

Location permission is optional. If you say no, your report is still accepted. Either way, only the yes/no result described above is sent to our servers.

How Data Is Used

The only purpose of this data is to calculate and show an estimated ER wait time to the Sarnia community:

• Every 5 minutes, recent reports are combined into one summary (a typical wait time, how many reports it is based on, and a confidence level).
• Individual reports are deleted about 12 hours after submission.
• Only the anonymous summary is shown in the app.

We do not use your data for advertising, profiling, or any purpose beyond the above.

Data Storage and Security

Data is stored with our database provider, Supabase, on servers located in the United States (Oregon). This means the anonymous data described above may be subject to U.S. law while it is stored there. All data is sent over encrypted HTTPS connections.

Access rules on the database prevent the app, or anyone using its public connection details, from reading individual reports. Updates go through server-side checks that validate each step.

Children

This app is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect information from children.

Your Rights (PIPEDA)

Under Canada's Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), you may ask to access, correct, or delete personal information we hold about you. Because we do not collect identifying information and individual reports are deleted within about 12 hours, there is usually nothing to retrieve, but we will help with any reasonable request.

Contact us at ithero.services@gmail.com.

Changes to This Policy

If we materially change how we handle data, we will update this page and the "Last updated" date above.

Contact

IThero Solutions
Sarnia, Ontario, Canada
ithero.services@gmail.com
itherosolutions.ca