Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how TZANEEN Healthcare Hub (“we”, “us”) handles personal information when you use our website, book an appointment, register as a patient, or take part in a telehealth consultation.

We process personal information in terms of the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA) and, for health information, the confidentiality obligations that apply to healthcare providers under the National Health Act 61 of 2003.

TZANEEN Healthcare Hub, Roettgers-Setimela Avenue, R71 Aqua Park, Tzaneen, Limpopo 0850, South Africa, is the responsible party for the personal information described in this policy.

Our Information Officer can be reached at info@tzaneenhealthcarehub.co.za or on 083 843 0000. Please use the subject line “POPIA” so your request is routed correctly.

Depending on how you use our services, we may collect:

• Account and identity: your name, email address, contact number and account credentials.
• Appointment details: the practitioner and service you booked, the date and time, and the reason for your visit.
• Health information: information you or your practitioner record during a consultation, including notes, diagnoses, prescriptions, referrals, test results and, where relevant, telehealth consultation records.
• Telehealth data: consultation times, session identifiers and messages you send through the platform. Video and audio streams are used to conduct the consultation and are not stored by us as recordings.
• Payment and billing: medical aid details, scheme and membership numbers, and amounts billed. Full card details are handled by our payment providers and are not stored by us.
• Technical and usage data: IP address, browser and device type, pages viewed and error logs.

• to create and manage your account and verify your identity;
• to schedule, confirm, remind you about and deliver appointments, including telehealth consultations;
• to keep medical records and support the practitioners who treat you;
• to process billing and submit claims to your medical aid, where you have asked us to;
• to respond to enquiries and complaints;
• to keep the website secure, diagnose faults and improve our services;
• to meet our legal, professional and regulatory obligations.

We process your information with your consent, to perform our agreement with you, to comply with legal obligations, and for legitimate interests such as keeping our services secure and functioning.

Health information is “special personal information” under POPIA. We process it only where the law allows — generally with your consent, or because processing is necessary for the proper treatment and care of a patient by a healthcare professional who is subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We do not sell your personal information. We share it only as needed for your care and to run the service:

• Practitioners and specialists involved in your care, including referral partners, laboratories and radiology providers.
• Your medical aid or scheme when you ask us to submit a claim.
• Service providers that host and operate our platform, acting on our instructions. These include our authentication provider (Clerk), our file storage provider (UploadThing), our video consultation provider (Daily), our email provider (Resend) and our SMS/WhatsApp provider (Twilio).
• Professional advisers, auditors and regulators where the law requires it.

We may also disclose information where we are legally obliged to do so, or where it is necessary to prevent a serious and imminent threat to life or health.

Some of our service providers store data outside South Africa. Where that happens, we take reasonable steps to ensure the information receives a level of protection that is substantially similar to POPIA, and we remain accountable for it.

We keep personal information only for as long as we need it for the purpose it was collected, or for as long as the law requires. In particular, health records must be kept for the retention periods set out in the National Health Act, after which they are securely deleted or destroyed. Account and website usage data are kept for shorter periods.

We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your information, including access controls, encryption in transit, secure authentication and restricted internal access on a need-to-know basis. No system can be guaranteed to be completely secure, but if a breach occurs that affects you we will notify you and the Information Regulator as POPIA requires.

Under POPIA you have the right to:

• be told that we hold personal information about you, and to request a copy of it;
• ask us to correct or update information that is inaccurate;
• ask us to delete or destroy information that we are no longer entitled to keep;
• object to processing, or withdraw consent you previously gave (for example, consent to telehealth);
• object to your information being used for direct marketing at any time;
• lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator (South Africa).

To exercise any of these rights, contact our Information Officer using the details in section 2. We may ask you to verify your identity before acting on a request.

Accounts are intended for adults. A parent or legal guardian may manage an appointment for a minor in their care. We only process a child’s personal information with the consent of a competent person, as POPIA requires.

We may send you service-related messages such as appointment confirmations and reminders, which are part of the service and cannot be turned off. We will only send you other marketing or newsletter messages if you have opted in, and you can opt out at any time.

We may update this policy to reflect changes in our practices or the law. The current version always appears on this page with the “Last updated” date at the top. Material changes will be brought to your attention where appropriate.

Please raise any privacy question or complaint with our Information Officer first, at info@tzaneenhealthcarehub.co.za. You also have the right to complain to the Information Regulator:

• Website: inforeg.org.za
• Email: complaints@inforeg.org.za

See also our Terms & Conditions and Cookie Policy.