Informed Consent

📱 Using the ShockTalk App for Notifications

Thanks for choosing ShockTalk! The ShockTalk mobile app is the main way we send simple, helpful updates like:

🔔 Appointment reminders

💡 Provider match notifications

🌿 Wellness check-ins and gentle nudges

📬 In-app messages and care-related updates

📱 Why ShockTalk?

🌎 Built for Care: The app is designed specifically for the ShockTalk experience, so notifications, updates, and care tools can live in one place.

📲 More Private Than Social Messaging: Using the app helps reduce reliance on third-party social messaging platforms for core care communications.

🤝 Culturally Tailored Connection: ShockTalk is designed to support meaningful, culturally grounded relationships between patients, peers, traditional healers, and providers.

🧭 Clearer Experience: The app makes it easier to manage reminders, scheduling updates, and communication without mixing care notifications into personal social messages.

🔐 Privacy and Security

🔒 Protected Access: Access to the ShockTalk app is protected through device-level and account-level security measures designed to help keep your information private.

🛡️ Sensitive Health Information Stays in Secure Clinical Systems: Your most sensitive health information, including clinical documentation and records, is stored and managed through HIPAA-compliant systems and workflows used by your provider—not in notification banners or simple alert text.

📋 Limited Notification Content: Push notifications are designed to be brief and minimal. For example, they may let you know that you have an appointment reminder, an update, or a message waiting in the app. They are not intended to include detailed medical or clinical information.

📹 Secure Telehealth Sessions: ShockTalk therapeutic sessions take place only through approved, secure telehealth tools used by your provider for care delivery.

🎙️ No Unauthorized Recording: ShockTalk will never record your therapeutic sessions without your Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC).

⚠️ Important Notice About Notifications

📡 Third-Party Delivery Services: Push notifications on iPhone are delivered through Apple’s push notification infrastructure, and similar platform services may be used on other devices. These services may process the technical information needed to deliver a notification.

🧾 Minimal Data in Alerts: Because notifications pass through platform delivery systems, ShockTalk designs notification content to minimize sensitive details and avoid placing detailed clinical information in push alerts.

📲 Notifications Are a Prompt, Not a Medical Record: Notifications are meant to direct you back into the ShockTalk app or your provider’s secure care workflow. They are not a replacement for your health record, treatment plan, or direct clinical communication.

📅 Scheduling and Booking Tools

📆 Scheduling Layers May Be Used: ShockTalk may use tools such as Calendly or similar scheduling platforms to support appointment booking and coordination.

🛡️ Clinical Records Stay Separate: These scheduling tools are used for logistics and convenience, not for storing full clinical records. Sensitive documentation and care-related records remain in secure clinical systems.

🤔 Is this unusual?

Not at all! This is similar to how widely-used services operate:

📩 Many organizations use basic reminders through apps, email, or SMS while keeping sensitive health information in separate secure systems.

📆 Many providers use scheduling tools to coordinate appointments, while detailed clinical documentation stays in HIPAA-compliant platforms designed for healthcare.

ShockTalk follows this familiar model—making sure your most sensitive health information remains safe and secure at all times, while giving you a convenient, culturally tailored experience.

✊🏽 Your Data, Your Choice

At ShockTalk, you control your information:

📧 If you have any questions or need support, reach out at [email protected] or via Instagram any time!