Robotic Tendencies
The personal blog of Robert McQueen

August 2, 2005

A good idea

I’ve sometimes pondered what would happen to me if I was out on my own, was in some kind of an accident and the ambulance staff didn’t know who to contact, so I’ve always kept obvious things like “Home” and “Mum” in my mobile’s phone book even though I know their numbers. I’ve just heard about the “In Case of Emergency” (ICE) campaign, where you prefix a number in your phone book with ICE, so the ambulance staff can find it quickly and know who to contact to seek consent for emergency treatment. According to Vodafone, “75% of people carry no details of who they would like telephoned following a serious accident”. More details from East Anglian Ambulance Service and Vodafone.

posted by ramcq @ 12:30 am
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2 responses to “A good idea”

  1. Matt says:

    I’d have thought that putting emergency contact details in a card in one’s wallet would be a better plan for several reasons:

    a) This way they know the identity of the injured party.
    b) they know who they’re calling, so they can speak to the most appropriate person at the other end.
    c) in one popular mobile OS if you have the same number more than once in your phone book then it gets confused when they call you, and doesn’t display a number.
    d) IME, more people keep their wallets on their person than keep phones (phones are more likely to be in bags), and if you’re part of an incident like 7th July then it may not be trivial to associate bags to bodies.
    e) My wallet doesn’t have a PIN lock, nor a confusing half-brain UI.

    But, is rooting through wallets a risky business in an emergency, in case you get accused of stealing money?

  2. Hmmz says:

    My home number is down as ‘fit bird’. I wonder if they’ll know who to call when they scoop my ashes out of the next terrorist attack.

    I’m afraid, are YOU!?!?!?!!?!/1/121/312312£$134134

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