Privacy Policy

Boston Global Medical Collaboration ("BGMC," "we," "us") respects your privacy. This policy explains what information we collect through this website, how we use it, and the choices you have.

Inquiries: your name, email, organization, location, chosen topic, message, expected timing and consent record. We use these details to review and respond to partnership, sponsorship, faculty, community and support requests.

Member profiles: optional organization, profession and learning interests, plus your notification preferences. These choices are separate from event registration preferences. Membership status and payment references support account management and resource access.

Event attendance registration: your name, email address and selected roles. Attendance forms ask for your country or region. WeChat ID is required on Chinese attendance forms and optional on English forms. City, organization, professional field or title, phone, interests, speaker question and how you heard about the event are optional. Partner registration links record a source code. We also record your choice about future updates and when that choice was made.

Abstract submissions: your abstract text, title, track, category, author names, contact email, affiliations and disclosures. High-school submissions also include school, grade and a student contribution statement; teacher or mentor information is optional. We store submission acknowledgements, payment references and review records. Do not include identifiable research-participant information.

Donations: an optional name and email address if you choose to provide them. Your payment card details are entered directly into Stripe, our payment processor — we never see or store your card number.

Staff and admin accounts: an email address and, if you choose to sign in with Google, basic profile information from your Google account. This is handled by our authentication provider, Clerk.

To confirm and manage event registrations, and to send you event details such as access links or logistics once they're finalized.

To administer abstract submissions, collect review fees, support committee review and arrange poster presentations. Accepted abstracts and their author information may appear in the symposium proceedings and poster session, as described in the submission guidelines. Internal reviewer notes are not public.

Optional background and questions help us prepare event discussions. Referral information helps us understand how participants find the event. Future event and course updates are sent only if you opt in; you can contact us to withdraw that choice.

To process donations and, where applicable, issue confirmation of your gift.

To operate member, staff and admin accounts, provide authorized resource access, and manage membership and inquiries.

We do not sell your information, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

We rely on a small number of service providers to run this site: Vercel (hosting and storage of uploaded images), Neon (database), Stripe (payment processing), Clerk (staff sign-in) with Cloudflare Turnstile (bot check on the sign-in form), Cloudflare R2 or a similar host (event recordings), and, when active, an email delivery service to send event messages. Each provider only receives the information needed to perform its function.

For abstract fees, Stripe receives the contact email, fee and submission reference/track. The abstract body is not sent to Stripe. Payment card details are entered on Stripe's checkout, not stored by this website.

We use functional cookies for account access and local storage for your language preference. When website measurement is enabled, you can choose whether BGMC may measure public page visits, named button interactions and form milestones. We do not use advertising cookies.

Saving an abstract creates a private access cookie in that browser for up to 180 days. It allows you to view your submission and resume payment without exposing unpublished work through a public link. Clearing the cookie or using another browser requires assistance from the team to regain access.

When you open an event recording you enter your email address. We use it to give you access and to keep a list of who has watched (the email, when you first and last watched, and how many times), which our team can see. Doing this sets a signed access cookie that lasts at most 3 hours and is removed when you close your browser, limited to that event's watch page. See the Cookie Policy for the full list of cookies and browser storage.

With your permission, BGMC stores random browser and session identifiers, public page/content identifiers and revisions, interaction times, visit language, device category, approved campaign categories and minimal saved-outcome milestones in its own database. When you submit a form, we can connect that consenting browsing session to the saved registration, inquiry or abstract to measure completion. These identifiers are pseudonymous rather than fully anonymous. We do not record form answers, contact details, unpublished abstracts, session recordings or private account/admin page activity in measurement events.

The session cookie expires after 30 minutes without received activity. Measurement preferences and the browser cookie last up to 90 days and renew when used. Raw measurement records are removed after 90 days by daily maintenance. Change your choice through Measurement preferences in the footer; choosing essential only stops collection and deletes this browser's retained measurement sessions, leaving business records intact. Short-lived keyed abuse counters expire after an hour and do not store raw IP addresses.

Measurement is used to understand website use and improve content and registration flow. Our hosting and database service providers process this data to operate BGMC; it is not sent to a separate analytics vendor.

We keep registration, abstract submission and donation records for as long as reasonably needed for event administration, review, financial record-keeping, and legal compliance. You can ask us to delete or correct your information at any time — see Contact below.

You may ask us to review, correct, or delete the personal information we hold about you. Use the request form at /privacy/request or email us at the address below. We'll confirm it's you before changing or removing anything, and reply as promptly as we can.

Registration, inquiry and donation forms are intended for people 18 or older. If you are under 18, please ask a parent or guardian to register or contact us on your behalf. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13; if you believe we have, contact us and we will delete it. The student abstract track described below is the one exception designed for students in Grades 9–12.

The High School Research & Innovation Track is intended for students in Grades 9–12, including students under 18. It collects the author, school, grade, project and contact information described above to administer submissions and review. Students and their parents or guardians may contact us with questions or requests to correct or delete submitted personal information. Please do not submit identifiable information about children or other research participants in an abstract.

We may update this policy as the site and our programs evolve. We'll update the date above when we do.