Privacy Policy

Who we are

This is the privacy policy for Patient Compass, published on the web and distributed through the Apple App Store and Google Play (uk.co.patientcompass.compass). It is provided by GGO Systems Ltd (the platform operator), a company registered in England and Wales, company number 17268411. Your clinical care is provided by your own surgical team, not by us.

Patient Compass brings together Polaris for information before surgery and The Compass for recovery after surgery. This notice covers both parts of that patient journey.

GGO Systems Ltd is the data controller for this application. We are registered with the Information Commissioner's Office (registration number ZC174006). For any data query, contact us at: info@ggo-systems.com

No account, no sign-in

Patient Compass has no patient account and no sign-in. You reach the parts of your journey granted by your surgical team through one time-limited link or code. We do not ask for your name, email address, date of birth or NHS number, and we do not collect your contacts, location, photo library or advertising identifiers.

We do not read or store any persistent device identifier — no IMEI, IMSI, SIM serial number, MAC address, Android ID, advertising ID or app set ID. The app may ask to use the camera when you choose to scan a QR code; the image is processed on your device and is not photographed, uploaded or stored. The recovery part may also ask permission to show notifications, but only if you switch on daily reminders yourself.

What data we store

A secure, time-limited access cookie records the journey your team granted. It contains your organisation and the relevant pathway identifiers and may include a site, a proposed surgery date and predefined discharge choices. It contains no patient name or account identifier. A proposed date is only a pre-fill: Patient Compass asks you to confirm it before using it for recovery timing.

A separate encrypted resume cookie remembers only the organisation, the Patient Compass product, the last page and the access expiry. It lets the app return to your journey after a restart. It contains no access link or patient identity and cannot grant access by itself.

The parts of Patient Compass can also keep the following choices on your device:

• Your accessibility, reading-mode and presentation preferences
• Any pathway branch you select while reading information before surgery
• Your confirmed procedure, hospital or site, and surgery date
• Your completed recovery milestones and reminder preference
• Any notes you write for your follow-up appointment
• Legacy display preferences, if saved by an earlier version

Recovery details can be kept for your current visit without saving them for a return visit. Saving them for later requires functional storage consent. Anyone using the same browser may be able to read saved notes. Your care team does not receive them. Accessibility and reading preferences are saved without that consent because they are necessary to keep the app usable in the form you chose.

How we store it

Your preferences, recovery progress and notes are saved on your device. Polaris and The Compass use separate, secured web origins, so their local storage and access cookies remain separated even though you move between them in one app. Patient Compass Suite does not receive your locally saved progress or notes. We create no patient account or longitudinal server-side patient record, and we do not sell this data. Like any online service, our hosting provider handles basic technical request data when pages are loaded.

Everything the app loads is served over HTTPS, so pages and content are encrypted in transit. The access cookie is restricted to the product host that set it and expires no later than the link your surgical team issued.

Daily reminders

Reminders are off unless you switch them on, and switching them on is what triggers the notification permission prompt. They are scheduled entirely on your device from the surgery date already stored in your browser — no server is told your schedule, and there is no push registration, so nothing about you leaves the device. Each reminder names only the recovery day and invites you to open the app; it names no procedure and carries no clinical detail, so nothing sensitive appears on your lock screen. Switching reminders off cancels every scheduled notification.

Why we collect it

To show the information your team selected before surgery and provide a personalised day-by-day recovery companion afterwards. The locally saved recovery details let the app track progress, remind you of milestones and keep notes for your follow-up. Without functional-storage consent, you can still read the content, but recovery progress is not saved between sessions.

Your rights

Under UK GDPR, you have the right to:

• Access — your journey preferences, recovery progress and notes are available on your own device.
• Erasure— use the “Delete all my data” option in Settings, or clear this website's saved browser data.
• Withdraw consent — at any time via recovery Settings. This immediately deletes the consent-gated recovery data stored by The Compass.
• Complain— you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk.

Analytics & third parties

For anonymous, aggregate usage statistics we use Plausible Analytics, a privacy-preserving tool hosted in the EU (Germany). Plausible sets no cookies, stores no personal data, and cannot identify you or track you across sites, so no consent is required. We use no advertising trackers, no cross-site tracking and no profiling. No other data is shared with any third party.

Retention and deletion

There is no patient account to delete. The access cookie expires no later than the link issued by your team, and the functional-storage consent record expires after 90 days. You can delete recovery data immediately with “Delete all my data” in recovery Settings. You can remove all locally saved data, including Polaris and accessibility preferences, by clearing Patient Compass's app or website data from your device. We retain no server-side copy of locally saved progress or notes.

Children

Patient Compass is given to you by your surgical team as part of your own care. It is not directed at children and does not ask for a patient name or account identifier.

Policy changes

If we make material changes to how we store or use your data, we will update the date of this notice and, where it affects functional storage, prompt you to review and re-confirm your consent on your next visit.