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The Curious Bag
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Emergency services personnel often deal with unconscious patients who are unable to give them any medical history. The ICE system is the first standardized system that all rescue workers, police and doctors use to find family members and next of kin.
Function
The acronym ICE stands for "in case of emergency." ICE should be placed in a cell phone's address book with the phone number of the person or people who should be contacted should there be an emergency and the cell phone owner cannot respond to rescue workers.
Types
Having more than one ICE entry in a cell phone is allowed and encouraged. They should be denoted as ICE1, ICE2 and ICE3.
History
The ICE system was started in 2005 by paramedic Bob Brotchie in Cambridge, England. It was officially launched and made public with the help of Falklands war hero Simon Weston and British cellular company Vodafone.
Research
Of 285 patients with cells phones surveyed in a study at New York's Albany Medical Center, only 76 stated they knew what ICE was. Only 26 had ICE programmed into their cell phones, according to WebMD.
Application
EMS Options has developed a smartphone application called smartICE. The application uses the international ICE symbol to make it easily recognizable and not only contacts designated family members, but also gives doctors critical medical history.
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