Privacy policy

Who we are

This policy is published by Dr Sushrut’s Plastic and Cosmetic Surgery Clinic (“the clinic”, “we”, “us”), Sayar Clinic, Ayodhya Complex, in front of Canara Bank, Bibwewadi, Pune 411037. It covers this website, drsushrut.com, and the personal information we receive when you contact us or are treated by our doctors.

We handle personal information under the Information Technology Act, 2000 and its rules on sensitive personal data, the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and its rules as they come into force, and the duty of confidentiality that applies to every doctor in India.

What we collect

When you visit this website

You can read every page without telling us who you are. The website has no contact forms, logins or comment boxes, and we do not use analytics or advertising tools. The procedure search works inside your browser: what you type is not sent to us. If you use the website assistant, what you type is sent to write an answer: see the website assistant.

Like every website, ours is delivered by a hosting provider, Cloudflare. To send you the pages and keep the site safe from attacks, Cloudflare automatically processes technical details of each visit: your IP address, browser and device type, the page requested, the date and time, and the page that linked to us. We do not use these details to identify you.

When you contact us

Appointments are booked by phone call or WhatsApp, and you can also email us. When you do, we receive your name, phone number or email address, your WhatsApp profile name and photo if you have set them, and anything you choose to tell us, such as the procedure you are interested in, your symptoms or photographs.

Please share only what is needed to book a visit, and keep detailed medical questions for the consultation. Do not post health details in public comments on our Instagram, Facebook or YouTube pages; message us privately instead. If you share information about someone else, such as a family member, make sure they agree.

When you are our patient

To examine and treat you safely, we record information that may include:

• your name, age or date of birth, sex, address and contact details, and those of a relative or guardian;
• your medical history, current medicines, allergies, examination findings, diagnosis and treatment plan;
• test and scan reports, prescriptions, operation notes, consent forms and follow-up notes;
• clinical photographs taken before, during and after treatment;
• bills and payment records, and insurance details if you ask us to help with a claim.

Health information and medical records are sensitive personal data under Indian law, and we treat them that way.

Public reviews

If you post a review of the clinic on Google, it is public. We may quote it on this website with your name as it appears there. To have a quote removed, contact us (see Questions and complaints).

Why we use it

We use your personal information only to:

• reply to your enquiry and book, change or remind you of appointments;
• diagnose, treat and follow you up, including care arranged with hospitals, laboratories and other doctors;
• keep the medical records that doctors are required to keep;
• prepare bills, receipts and, at your request, insurance paperwork;
• act in a medical emergency;
• meet our legal duties and respond to lawful requests from authorities.

We do not sell, rent or trade personal information, add you to marketing lists, or use your information to target advertising.

Most of this information is needed to treat you safely, so you agree to us using it when you book a consultation or start treatment. Anything beyond your care, such as publishing your photographs, needs your separate written consent. You can withdraw consent at any time (see Your rights). Withdrawing does not undo what was done before, and we may still need to keep your medical records, as explained below.

Clinical photographs

Photographs taken for your treatment are part of your medical record. We show them on this website or on our social media only if you have given written consent for that. Before publishing we crop out or hide identifying features where possible and remove hidden file data such as location. Photographs of sensitive areas stay blurred until a visitor chooses to view them.

If you withdraw your consent, we will remove your photographs from this website and from our own social media accounts. We cannot recall copies that other people have already saved or shared.

Who we share it with

We share personal information only when it is needed, and only with:

• people involved in your care: the hospital where your surgery takes place, anaesthetists, laboratories, imaging centres, pharmacies and doctors we refer you to;
• your insurer or its third-party administrator, when you ask us to support a claim;
• your parent, guardian or a person you nominate, where the law allows;
• service providers that carry or store messages and this website for us: Cloudflare (website hosting and the website assistant), WhatsApp, which belongs to Meta (messages and calls), Google (email, maps and YouTube) and telephone networks. They handle data under their own privacy policies;
• authorities, when the law requires it, for example under a court order or in a medico-legal case.

Videos and links on this website

YouTube videos. Videos play in YouTube’s privacy-enhanced player (youtube-nocookie.com). A player loads only when you tap a video or, on the home page, when a short silent preview starts as the video section scrolls into view. Previews do not start if your device asks for reduced motion or data saving. Once a player loads, Google receives your IP address and browser details and may store information on your device, and when you play a video, Google’s privacy policy applies. Some video thumbnails are loaded from YouTube’s image servers.

Links to other services. Our WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Google Maps, phone and email links open those services, and their own privacy policies apply: Google and YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook and Cloudflare.

The website assistant

Aaru AI, the website assistant, is an AI program, not the doctor or clinic staff. Its answers come from the pages of this website and from general medical information. They can be wrong, and they are not medical advice, a diagnosis or a consultation.

When you send a question, it goes with the earlier messages of the same conversation to Cloudflare Workers AI, which writes the answer on Cloudflare’s servers with an openly available AI model. Cloudflare states that it does not keep these messages once the answer is sent and does not use them to train AI models (Workers AI data usage). We do not store or read the conversations, and they are not linked to your name or number. The conversation exists only in the open page and is gone when you close or reload it. As for any page visit, Cloudflare processes your IP address to deliver the answer and to limit misuse.

Voice typing uses your browser’s own speech features. When you tap the microphone, your browser turns what you say into text; some browsers do this on their maker’s servers (for example Google for Chrome, Apple for Safari), under that company’s privacy terms. Where the browser cannot do this, the short recording is sent to Cloudflare Workers AI to be written out, and is not kept, just like the messages. Either way, the text appears in the box first and is only sent to the assistant when you choose to send it.

Please don’t type your name, phone number or other details that identify you. To talk about your own health, message or call the clinic. Messages that look like an emergency are answered in your browser with emergency numbers, without being sent.

Cookies

This website does not set cookies or store anything on your device itself. Two outside services can:

• Cloudflare may set a short-lived security cookie (such as __cf_bm or cf_clearance) when it needs to check that a visit comes from a person and not an automated attack. It is not used to track you.
• The YouTube player, once it loads, as described above.

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The website works without them, though videos may not play.

How we protect it

Access to patient information is limited to the doctors and staff who need it for your care, and they are bound by confidentiality. Patient records are not stored on this website. The website is served only over an encrypted connection (HTTPS) and does not load scripts from other companies, apart from the YouTube player described above.

No method of storing or sending information is completely secure. If a breach affects your personal information, we will inform you and the authorities as the law requires.

How long we keep it

• Enquiries that do not lead to a consultation are deleted once they are no longer needed to answer you.
• Medical records are kept for as long as medical regulations and the law require, and longer when they are needed for your continuing care or a legal claim. They are then securely destroyed.
• Website visit details are kept by Cloudflare for its own limited periods.

Children

For patients under 18, we collect information from, and ask consent of, a parent or lawful guardian, who can exercise the child’s rights described below. This website does not collect information from children, and we do not track or advertise to children.

Your rights

You can ask us to:

• tell you what personal information we hold about you, how we use it and who we have shared it with;
• give you copies of your medical records;
• correct, complete or update information that is wrong or out of date;
• delete information we no longer need, except records the law requires us to keep;
• stop using information you gave with your consent, by withdrawing it;
• let a person you nominate exercise these rights for you if you die or cannot do so yourself.

To make a request, contact us as described below. We may ask you to confirm your identity first so that we do not give your information to someone else. Please give us accurate information and keep it up to date.

Questions and complaints

For any question, request or complaint about your personal information, contact the clinic:

• Email: [email protected], with “Privacy” in the subject line
• Phone or WhatsApp: +91 98904 34447 (Mon-Sat, 5-9 pm)
• In person or by post: Sayar Clinic, Ayodhya Complex, in front of Canara Bank, Bibwewadi, Pune 411037

We will reply as soon as we can and within 30 days. If you are not satisfied with our reply, you can complain to the Data Protection Board of India under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023.

Changes to this policy

We will update this page when our practices or the law change. The date under the page title shows when it was last changed.