Updated 2026-09-26 · 4 min read
There are physiotherapy techniques for which the clinic asks for the patient's informed consent before the first session: dry needling, percutaneous electrolysis, spinal manipulation, some invasive techniques or follow-up photos. Which techniques require it and what the text says is decided by each clinic with its professional judgement and its country's regulations.
What tends to be the same everywhere is how it's collected: a printed sheet the patient signs at reception, standing up and in a hurry, that ends up in a folder. When one day it needs to be shown, it has to be found. This article is about how to do it better without making things complicated.
The problem with the sheet at reception
Consent exists so the patient understands what they're agreeing to. Signed at the counter, with the session about to start and someone waiting behind, it's barely read and even less understood. And for the clinic it has another problem: a signed sheet doesn't say which version of the text was read, and if the text changed later, nobody knows which one each patient signed.
What has to be kept
An «agreed» isn't enough. What's worth keeping is whatever would let you answer, years later, the question «what exactly did this patient sign?»:
| What's kept | What for |
|---|---|
| The exact text they read | Not today's text: that day's, with its version. |
| Who signed and when | The patient's name, the date and the time. |
| From where | The device and connection it was signed from. |
| A fingerprint of the text | To prove the document hasn't been touched since. |
| A PDF | To hand over or file whenever it's requested. |
Signing it at home, before the session
The simple alternative is to send the consent before the session, through a private link. The patient opens it on their phone, reads it calmly at home, asks about anything they don't understand and signs it. The next day there's no paper to look for: it's in their record, with the exact time of signing.
Two details matter. The link has to be private —only that patient can open it— and expire after a while. And if the clinic changes the text, what has already been signed has to remain valid for what was signed: the change moves up a version, it doesn't rewrite the past.
Before and after photos
Many clinics use photos to follow the progress of a posture or a scar. At a clinic those photos are health data, and the prudent thing is not to keep them without a signed consent from that person. If the system checks it on its own, nobody has to remember.
How it's done in ClaudIA
In ClaudIA the consent text is written once and assigned to the treatments that require it. From the patient's record you prepare theirs, already with their name, and send them the link by WhatsApp. They open it with the last four digits of their phone number, read it and sign it with their name and a tick box. The link expires after 30 days.
What's kept is the text exactly as they read it, with its version and its fingerprint, the date, the time, the IP address and the browser, and the PDF is generated when needed. Photos the patient sends by WhatsApp are marked as «before» or «after» and stay in their record, and the system doesn't keep them without a signed consent. It's all in the «signed consent» feature page.
Questions clinics ask
Which physiotherapy techniques usually require informed consent? It depends on the clinic and its country, but it's common for dry needling, percutaneous electrolysis, spinal manipulation, other invasive techniques and follow-up photos. The text and which treatments it's assigned to are always decided by the clinic.
Is signing it from the phone valid? The signature is stored with the exact text that was read, its version and its fingerprint, the date, the time, the IP address and the browser, and it can be exported as a PDF. Which specific requirements your regulations set is worth confirming with your professional body or your adviser.
What happens to what's been signed if I change the text? The text moves up a version and what has already been signed remains valid for what was signed: each patient's record keeps the version they read, not today's.
Does ClaudIA send the consent on its own? No: the team prepares the link from the patient's record and sends it by WhatsApp. ClaudIA doesn't decide which techniques require it or what the text says; that's the clinic's judgement.