If you’ve ever had a medical emergency in your home, you might recognize the importance of having medical information on hand and ready. Where should you keep this important information? Do paramedics and EMTs really look in a patient’s refrigerator or cell phone to find medical information?Whether it’s on your fridge, in your wallet, on the door, or on your phone, let’s talk about what medical information is needed if you ever have a medical emergency.
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Finding Medical Information in an Emergency
So where do paramedics and EMTs usually look for information when they enter your home? Let’s look at the places emergency responders may think to look and then talk about the options you have.
On a Person’s Body
Some people wearmedical alert braceletsor necklaces with their medical information easy to access. You may be familiar withMedicAlert, though there are several different brands. This jewelry gives responders quick information on your allergies, medical conditions, and even code status. Some are also connected to databases that store further information. Not everyone likes to wear jewelry, however, and even those who do may forget to keep their bracelet on their arm.
Other information that would be helpful is whether or not you have a seizure disorder. Allergies that can cause anaphylaxis (for example, bees) should be on there. Mild allergies generally aren’t as important, and considering these could waste valuable time in an emergency. You should list any heart medications you are taking, but a drug to control your cholesterol probably isn’t necessary.
Checking the Fridge
The Front Door
Your Wallet or Purse
Wallet cards can be one good place to keep your medical information but are not the first place most emergency responders look. These are most helpful for medical professionals after you arrive in the emergency room, so it’s good to have your information elsewhere as well.
Checking a Cell Phone
Emergency responders may or may not look at your cell phone. As with wallet cards, these will probably be brought to the hospital (if it is found near you) but may not be looked at until you get there.
We have ICE entries on our cell phones, like many others, but don’t know if emergency responders would ever look for it. That said, it’s free and may help in an emergency. To create one of your own, put “ICE” next to a contact’s name on your cell phone. It may, for instance, say “ICE – Wife” before your wife’s name (no jokes as to the way that reads.) This entry helps responders who might look for an emergency contact know they were calling your ICE contact and that the contact is your wife.
Many EMTs and paramedics will tell you that they have never looked at a cell phone to find contact information during an emergency. If the cell phone does make it to the hospital, a health professional in the emergency room would be more likely to dig through it for phone numbers.
Medical Tattoos
In recent years some people have taken to having medical tattoos instead of wearing a medical alert bracelet or necklace. While tattoos aren’t likely to be left off of your person in an emergency, EMTs, and paramedics don’t ordinarily look for tattoos. A tattoo isn’t likely to save your life, or, conversely, keep paramedics from performing CPR if you are DNR.
What to Do
Paramedics and EMTs are trained to do as much investigating as possible to figure out what is wrong with a patient. Though there’s no way to guarantee we’ll find the information left for us, there are some standards that we are used to seeing.
We’ll look for medications throughout the house. Wherever you store medication bottles, keep a form with medical information. Include the following important personal medical information:
Never put your social security number on your list; it is unnecessary in an emergency and could set you up for identity theft.
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