ICE Cell Phone Entry
ICE, also I.C.E.) stands for In Case of Emergency. This is a entry that people have been being encouraged to place in their cell phones with information on who is to be contacted in the event of an emergency. There has been a rumor that this is part of a virus propagating through cell phones and sending itself to the entries listed as ICE, but that rumor is false and was started by someone with too much time on their hands and not enough conscience.
ICE is unlikely to be used by on the scene paramedics when they arrive at an accident, but - provided doctors can match the cell phone to the right person and the cell phone was not lost or damaged in the cause of the accident - the ICE entry allows the hospital to determine within minutes instead of what could be days or hours who the emergency contact for someone is.
Emergency personnel advise that while ICE is most assuredly a good idea, it should not be the only source of such information. Carrying something even as innocent as a slip of paper in your purse or wallet with information on who should be contacted can make this process much easier on emergency personnel and potentially save the life of an injured person by allowing the hospital to contact someone that knows about drug allergies and other health issues.
The best advice is to do both. Carry the information on you written on a slip of paper, and enter ICE information in your cell phone. It is 100% safe to do, no matter what some e-mails say, and it could save your life.
I recommend, as inexpensive as the stuff to do it is, get a page of card stock and create a business sized card on your computer (I'll load up a template later), enter the information on the card then laminate it. You can place the lamination stuff between two sheets of paper and use a standard iron set for cotton to fuse it together. This gives you a card that can withstand getting wet, which seems to be one of the major concerns of EMT personnel on both the paper with information and the cell phone ICE entry - both are subject to damage by water.
ICE is unlikely to be used by on the scene paramedics when they arrive at an accident, but - provided doctors can match the cell phone to the right person and the cell phone was not lost or damaged in the cause of the accident - the ICE entry allows the hospital to determine within minutes instead of what could be days or hours who the emergency contact for someone is.
Emergency personnel advise that while ICE is most assuredly a good idea, it should not be the only source of such information. Carrying something even as innocent as a slip of paper in your purse or wallet with information on who should be contacted can make this process much easier on emergency personnel and potentially save the life of an injured person by allowing the hospital to contact someone that knows about drug allergies and other health issues.
The best advice is to do both. Carry the information on you written on a slip of paper, and enter ICE information in your cell phone. It is 100% safe to do, no matter what some e-mails say, and it could save your life.
I recommend, as inexpensive as the stuff to do it is, get a page of card stock and create a business sized card on your computer (I'll load up a template later), enter the information on the card then laminate it. You can place the lamination stuff between two sheets of paper and use a standard iron set for cotton to fuse it together. This gives you a card that can withstand getting wet, which seems to be one of the major concerns of EMT personnel on both the paper with information and the cell phone ICE entry - both are subject to damage by water.
posted by Sandra at 10:26 AM
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