American Red Cross Apps

March 2, 2013

There’s an app for that!

The American Red Cross has helpful emergency-specific apps that can be downloaded right to our mobile devices.  And they’re free!  They provides information to help us be better prepared for various types of emergency situations, as well as info to help us deal with the emergency, too.

shelter-finder

The following Red Cross Mobile Apps are available:

  • First Aid App
  • Shelter Finder App
  • Tornado App
  • Hurricane App
  • Earthquake App
  • Wildfire App

Check it out at http://www.redcross.org/prepare/mobile-apps.

I downloaded the First Aid and the Earthquake Apps.  Now, real-time U.S. Geological Survey alerts of earthquakes will be sent directly to my cell phone.  There are lots of information and tools to help get better prepared for earthquakes; what to do before, during, and after an earthquake.

Right in the app, you can quickly turn your mobile device into a handy flashlight, strobe light, or audible alarm.  Nice.

Another neat feature is the “I’m Safe” tool.  It helps you quickly use Facebook, Twitter, Message, and/or Email to send a message to let your loved ones, employer, friends, whoever you want, that you’re okay.

The app even has a section of helpful info and a checklist for post disaster steps for taking care of the emotional health of you and your family. Such an important consideration that is often not prepared for.

If you’re interested, you can join their Mobile User Group and help test new features, develop new ideas, and give your opinions about the various mobile products.  Awesome way to stay up on what’s on the horizon.

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In Case of Emergency – ICE

August 24, 2012

Most of my blogs provide insights into how you can be better prepared to act in the event of an emergency situation.  This article has a little different spin.  It’s for times when you can’t help yourself and your care is totally in the hands of someone who doesn’t know you.   Let’s say you were incapacitated by an accident or illness while away from home and work.  You were by yourself, no friends, co-workers, or family members with you.  Would the first responders know who you would want them to contact?  Would they know if you had any medical conditions that could affect their decisions about your care?

Think it won’t happen to you?  The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that in 2006 1,600,000 emergency room patients could not provide contact information because they were incapacitated.

Sure, your address and maybe home phone number should be available to them through the Department of Motor Vehicles with your car registration or your driver’s license.  That might be the best number to reach your loved ones; or it might not.

If you want your emergency care team (such as paramedics, firefighters, police officers, and hospital personnel) to have easy access to important information about you, there are several ways to make it available to them.

Medical alert bracelets and necklaces are key if you have life-threatening issues.

The low-tech, old fashion method of putting critical information in your wallet is a great way to provide whatever information you want first responders to have.

Another concept was developed by a British paramedic in the mid-2000’s – programming one or more ICE contacts in your cell phone.  Then, if your cell phone is with you, unlocked, and working, responders have access to information about who you would like called in case of an emergency.

Here’s how to ICE your cell phone:

  1. Choose a responsible person/people to be your emergency contact.  Select this person (or more than one person) wisely.  Select someone who could actually be helpful in an emergency situation.  If you think about it, some of your relatives and friends might not do so well getting a call that you’ve been badly injured.  A hysterical person could be more of a liability.  Others would be able to calmly provide helpful information and appropriately share information about your situation to others.
  2. Inform your ICE contact that you have designated them, and provide them with information that could affect your treatment.  This includes information on medicine you’re taking, allergies that you have (specifically to medicine and foods), and contact information for your doctors.  Also provide them with information about anyone else that you would like them to tell about your situation.
  3. Add this contact in your mobile phone contacts with the expression ICE before their name.  Such as ICE-Liz.  As they have time and the need for such info, first responders and hospital staff can readily find it.

Of course there’s no guarantee that your phone will be with you, available, found, working, unlocked, or that they’ll have time to use it.  But it’s one more tool to help communicate important information when you can’t do it yourself.  At a minimum, it will increase the chances that your critical medical information will be available to enhance the success of your emergency treatment.

And if you’re heard about scams related to using ICE, it’s a good idea to check out what Snopes says about the concept:  http://www.snopes.com/crime/prevent/icephone.asp

Programming an ICE contact in your phone only takes minutes, and it may save you or your loved ones hours of anguish in the event of an emergency.

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Near-Home Reunion Location

May 20, 2012

Many families have home evacuation plans, including a means for each capable family member to escape from every room, as well as a plan to help any who can’t get out on their own.  Practicing such evacuations will make it second nature should the need arise and will help you to identify difficult-to-dump rooms and other challenges.  I’ll write more on all that in a future post.  For now I want you to think about what to do once you all dive out of the windows.

I heard a story about a family in Texas.  They taught their three young children the importance of getting out of the house quickly and under what situations they should evacuate.  They had drills where each family member, including the kids, practiced escaping from their bedrooms and from the family room.  Very impressive.

Then one night, the worst happened.  The parents were awakened by the shrieking smoke detector!  Smoke was billowing through the hallway!  They jumped out of their bedroom window, just as they had practiced, and ran to the front yard.  There they joined two of their three children.  It took the dad and a neighbor to hold back the mom, who wanted to go back in to rescue her youngest son, 6-year-old Johnny.  Fifteen long minutes later, a fireman spotted Johnny, who had been worrying about the rest of the family, alone in the backyard.  He too had climbed out of the window, just like they had practiced.  But no one had talked about what to do next.

Pick a reunion location near your house, a place for everyone to gather if you have to quickly evacuate.  The reunion location can be at your mailbox, under the big tree across the street, or any spot that everyone in the family can remember and easily get to.  Then, when you talk about your evacuation plan and when you practice it, take the next step, tell everyone to go to the reunion location.  Practice meeting there.

Had that Texas family included a reunion location in their family evacuation plan, they would not have had to suffer through that incredibly long 15-minute wait before knowing that all their family members were safe.

 

Leave a Comment » | Communication, Kids/Youth | Permalink
Posted by MoreReadyToday

My Philosophy

March 24, 2012

Getting your family prepared for a big emergency situation like a hurricane or an earthquake or a tornado or an ice storm or . . . . . . can feel quite overwhelming.

Where do we begin?  And how can we possibly get ready for it?  There are so many possible scenarios.  There’s so much information out there.  Where should we start?  Lots of people get immobilized by the perceived magnitude of the effort.  It’s just too daunting to think about.  Others feel like it’s hopeless, that the odds are so stacked against us, there’s no reason to even try.

I hope to take the overwhelmedness out of it for you by providing an action plan that is tailored to your specific family.  And I hope to inspire you to start picking away at those actions by showing you how it can help your family be more comfortable, less stressed, and more self-sufficient in any emergency situation.

My preparedness philosophy is based on three basic principles:
1.  You will never be completely ready, but you can be much better prepared. (Hence, More Ready Today.)
2. Preparing for most any emergency situation helps you be better prepared for just about any other emergency, too.
3.  It’s important to start now. (Hence, More Ready Today.)

You won’t ever really be ready. No matter how much water, food, and supplies you put away.  No matter how many skills you learn.  No matter how many redundancies upon redundancies you have, there likely will be some aspect of the emergency situation that seems to trump your preparedness.  This is due to the unpredictable nature of such situations, and sometimes their sheer magnitude.

Just start.  With each small step that you take, you’ll make your life a whole lot easier and less stressful than if you do nothing.  I suggest that all families take the first two steps immediately.  Now.  Today.  Then pick away at other preparedness steps that you’ll read about in this blog and elsewhere.  You might be surprised how much of the plan you already have accomplished and didn’t even realize it.

This is Important – DO THIS TODAY!

I recommend that if you haven’t yet taken these first two steps, do them today.  These two actions cost little to no money and take very little time to implement.   What are those first two all-important steps?

  1. Store at least 3 gallons of water per person in unbreakable containers.  (And don’t forget water for your pets, too.)
  2. Develop a simple communication plan for your family.

No excuses.  Do it!  I don’t want to hear about the snow in your yard that can be melted or the lake a block away or the water in your toilet tanks.  Buy packaged water, or find or buy containers and fill them with water.  Fill them now.  Don’t wait until you find out how much chlorine to put in them in a future post.  Fill them now.

Your family communication plan should include:

  • A list (on paper, not just electronically) of all the important phone numbers for your family; with a copy for each family member
  • The phone number of an out-of-the-area person that everyone in the family agrees to call first in an emergency; this person will act as an information hub for you
  • A meet-up location outside your house in case you have to evacuate quickly
  • A meet-up location not in your neighborhood in case you can’t get home.

In future posts, I’ll share more on the why’s and how’s of these two steps, as well as loads of information on other actions and useful tips that will help your family to be more ready for the next big one.

Leave a Comment » | Communication, Safety/Security, Water | Permalink
Posted by MoreReadyToday