Acceptable Use & Data Minimization

1. Purpose and scope

This Policy sets the rules for using EMStriq and, above all, the rules for what patient information may and may not be entered. It applies to every Institution, every clinical site, and every person who uses the Service: students, applicants, independent students, faculty and program staff, preceptors, clinical-site members, and sponsors. It covers every part of the Service, including the preceptor portal, the clinical-site surface, offline use, and mobile apps.

2. What EMStriq is, and what it is not

EMStriq is a training record: a place for EMS students to document the patient encounters, procedures, and medications they performed during clinical and field education, for their program to review, grade, and report for accreditation and certification, and a place for programs and clinical sites to schedule students and manage their paperwork.

EMStriq is not:

an electronic health record or any part of the patient's medical record;
a patient-care reporting (ePCR) system or a place to store ePCR exports;
a billing or insurance system for patient care;
an emergency reporting or dispatch system; or
a source of medical, legal, or compliance advice.

The patient's record lives at the clinical site. What you document in EMStriq is about your training and must be minimized so that it cannot identify the patient.

3. Data minimization rules

3.1 Permitted

You may record the following about a patient encounter:

Patient age (capped at 90+)
Gender
Date of service
Location / facility
Chief complaint
Diagnosis
Disposition
Procedure details
De-identified narrative notes

3.2 Prohibited

You must never enter the following anywhere in EMStriq: not in a form field, not in narrative notes, not in a custom field, not in a comment, not in a shift note or message, and not in an uploaded file:

Patient names
MRNs
SSNs
Full date of birth
Addresses
Patient phone or email
Photos or images
Account / insurance numbers
Any free text that names a specific person

3.3 How to write a de-identified narrative

Describe the patient by age and gender only: "68-year-old male," "3-year-old female." For patients 90 and older, record "90+."
Do not record a patient's initials, nickname, room number combined with facility and date, employer, or any detail that, with the date and facility, would let someone recognize the person (an unusual occupation, a public figure, a co-worker, a family member).
Do not name other people either. Preceptors, physicians, nurses, bystanders, family members, and crew are referred to by role ("the attending," "the preceptor"), never by name, in narrative text. Preceptor identity is captured by the evaluation workflow, not by your notes.
Do not paste from an ePCR, chart, lab report, or monitor strip. Summarize in your own words.
Times of day are fine. Do not record a patient's date of birth, or an infant's exact age in months beyond what the age field allows.
If you are unsure whether a detail is identifying, leave it out. Nothing in a narrative is required for accreditation beyond the structured fields.

3.4 Uploads

Onboarding documents and wallet documents (immunization records, background checks, certifications, insurance cards, signed forms) are about you, the student, and are permitted. Upload only documents about yourself, and send to a program or share by link only what you intend to.
Never upload patient documents, ePCRs, run reports, ECG strips, imaging, photos of patients, or screenshots of a clinical site's systems.
Never upload another person's identity or health documents.

3.5 Application and interview data

Applicants provide their own information. Institution staff must not record information about an applicant that the Institution's own policies or law prohibit (for example protected characteristics not relevant to admission) and must not enter information about third parties beyond references the applicant provided.

3.6 Custom fields, forms, and course additions

Institutions and clinical sites that add custom procedures, medications, custom fields, onboarding requirements, or forms must design them so that answers cannot capture prohibited patient data. Do not create a free-text field, form field, or requirement whose purpose is to record a patient's name, identifier, or contact details. A form may ask for the student's own information only as far as the Institution or site has a legitimate need for it.

3.7 Clinical-site entries

Clinical sites and their members must not enter patient information in unit or place names, shift titles or notes, notes to schools or students, form fields, or any other part of the site surface.

4. Clinical sites and your own obligations

Your clinical site may impose stricter rules than this Policy. Follow the stricter rule. Using EMStriq does not transfer any obligation you have under HIPAA, state law, your site's policies, or your program's rules to EMStriq. You remain responsible for your own compliance.

5. Onboarding attestation

Every student completes the following attestation during onboarding: the onboarding screen shows it in full, and accepting this Policy and the Terms of Service is attesting to it. Students may be asked to re-attest when this Policy changes. The Service stores the version and the date you accepted.

Data minimization attestation
I understand that EMStriq is a training record and not a medical record. I will record only the permitted information about patient encounters (age, gender, date of service, location, chief complaint, diagnosis, disposition, procedure details, and de-identified notes), and I will never enter a patient's name, medical record number, Social Security number, full date of birth, address, phone number, email, photo, account or insurance number, or any free text that names a specific person.
I will document only encounters, procedures, and shifts that actually occurred and that I personally performed, observed, or attended as recorded. I will clock in and out only for myself, only when I am at the shift. I will not share my preceptor code with anyone other than my preceptor, and I will not sign, or ask anyone to sign, an evaluation or form they did not personally complete.
I remain responsible for my own obligations under HIPAA, state law, my clinical site's policies, and my program's rules.

6. Record integrity

The value of EMStriq to a student's certification and a program's accreditation depends entirely on records being true. The following are prohibited and will be treated as serious violations:

documenting an encounter, procedure, or medication you did not personally perform, observe, or attend as recorded;
documenting attempts or outcomes inaccurately;
clocking in or out for another person, asking someone to do so for you, or clocking in when you are not at the shift, including by falsifying your device's location;
backdating or altering a record to misrepresent when work occurred, other than correcting a genuine error before the chart is locked or through your program's documented correction process;
sharing your preceptor code (its QR code or eight-character form) with anyone other than the preceptor who supervised you, or completing a preceptor evaluation yourself;
grading your own shift on your own device, or letting a preceptor grade it while signed in as you or as a classmate;
reusing, copying, or forging a preceptor's signature, or using a saved signature on a device the preceptor did not authorize;
signing a form for someone else, or entering false information on a form; and
submitting evaluations of sites, preceptors, or the course on behalf of another student.

When you lock a chart, you have 5 minutes to reopen it yourself, and not after your preceptor has reviewed or commented on it. Every chart on a shift also locks automatically when your program's documentation window ends (24 hours after the shift by default). After that, changes require program staff and are recorded.

7. Roles and their limits

Students document their own training, respond to evaluations, sign up for shifts, manage their own onboarding and wallet documents, and sign their own forms. Students may not access other students' records.
Independent students use EMStriq to ask to join clinical sites, send availability, sign the sites' forms, and see their schedule. They do not log patient care in EMStriq.
Preceptors review and evaluate the students and shifts they personally supervised, through the student's preceptor code or the preceptor portal, using their own device and their own email. They may not use a preceptor code for a student they did not supervise, share sign-in codes, or attempt to access other program data.
Faculty and program staff use the permissions their Institution assigns. They may access student records only for legitimate educational purposes, must protect onboarding documents as sensitive personal information, send document packets only to the clinical site that needs them and only with the Institution's authority, and must not export or redisclose student data except as their Institution and FERPA permit.
Clinical-site members use the site surface to schedule and supervise students at their own site. They may use student information only for that purpose and for their relationship with linked schools, must keep any documents a school sends them confidential and use them only to clear students for placement, and must share the site's read-only schedule links only with their own personnel.
Sponsors use the sponsor portal only to review and pay for the students they sponsor.

8. Sharing documents and links

A wallet share link, a document-packet link, and a site's read-only crew link each let anyone who holds the link see what it covers until it expires or is revoked. Send them only to the people who need them, and revoke a link sent in error.
Recipients of shared documents may use them only for the purpose they were shared for (for example clearing a student for clinical placement), must not redistribute them, and should delete downloaded copies when they no longer need them, consistent with any agreement that governs them.
Do not try to open a link that was not meant for you, or to guess, alter, or reuse links, codes, or tokens.

9. Devices and offline use

Because EMStriq works offline, a copy of your recent data and any unsent entries is stored encrypted on your device.

Use a device lock (PIN, password, or biometric). The device lock is the boundary that protects the on-device copy.
Do not use a shared or public computer for clinical logging. If you must, sign out when finished; signing out removes the on-device key and copy.
Keep your device's operating system and browser updated.
Report a lost or stolen device that was signed in to EMStriq to your program and to security@emstriq.com promptly. We can end the session.
Do not clear the app's data or uninstall it while it shows unsent work. That work exists only on the device until it reconnects.

10. Reporting a concern

The Service lets students report concerns about their clinical experience, including harassment, unsafe conduct, patient safety, and exposures or injuries. Reports are not anonymous: the staff your Institution authorizes to receive them see who filed them. Report in good faith and accurately. EMStriq is not monitored in real time and is not an emergency service: for an emergency, an exposure, or an injury, follow your clinical site's and your program's procedures (the Service shows your program's instructions and contacts) and call 911 where appropriate.

11. Security and platform conduct

You may not:

share accounts, credentials, or one-time sign-in codes, or use another person's credentials;
attempt to access data, organizations, sites, or features you are not authorized to use, including by manipulating links, tokens, or codes;
probe, scan, or test the Service for vulnerabilities without written permission from EMStriq (responsible-disclosure reports are welcome at security@emstriq.com);
interfere with the Service, its infrastructure, rate limits, or bot protection;
scrape, harvest, or bulk-export data other than through export features provided to your role;
upload malicious code or content;
use the Service to send unsolicited or unlawful messages, or to harass, threaten, or discriminate against anyone; or
reverse engineer, copy, resell, or build a competing service from the Service, except as permitted by law.

12. Communications

The Service communicates by email today. Institutions and clinical sites that trigger messages to students, preceptors, site members, or sponsors are responsible for any consent those messages require. Messages from EMStriq never contain clinical logging data. If we add text messages or push notifications, you will be able to opt out (for text messages, by replying STOP).

13. Monitoring and enforcement

We may review usage and content to operate and secure the Service, to investigate suspected violations, and to respond to reports. Automated checks help enforce minimization and integrity (for example keeping clinical fields out of logs and emails, and flagging a preceptor grade made on a student's device), but they are not a substitute for your judgment.

Violations may result in warnings, removal of content, suspension or termination of access, notification of your Institution or the clinical site, and, for record falsification or misuse of evaluation credentials, notification of licensing or certifying bodies where required or appropriate. Institutions and clinical sites are responsible for applying their own academic, disciplinary, and site policies.

14. Reporting violations

Report suspected violations, security concerns, or entries that may contain prohibited data to your program staff and to security@emstriq.com. If you notice that you or someone else has entered prohibited data, report it promptly so it can be removed; good-faith reports will not be penalized.

15. Changes

We may update this Policy. Material changes will be posted with a new effective date and, where they change the attestation, will require students to re-attest in the Service. The Service records which version you accepted.