I don’t know about other Dallas moms, but this mom is addicted to her phone. Well no, addicted is too strong a word, but I will admit that I depend pretty heavily on it. I pretty much pull out my laptop only when absolutely necessary, and even watch more tv/netflix on my phone than on the actual television. Most of the information it contains (calendar, contact info, photos, etc.) is backed up elsewhere, but I can admit that the one time my phone took a plunge in the potty (and did recover, thanks to a couple days in a baggie of rice!) I felt like I was missing an arm.
And yet, I never password protected my phone. I can blame it on plenty of things, but the honest truth is I was too lazy to bother constantly typing in a code.
But then I had a child. . . a child who loves to get into things he shouldn’t, and before I knew it, he was sending bizarre texts and making phone calls (luckily the recipients were family members who thought this was “adorable”). Then I upgraded to a phone with the fancy touch print key and couldn’t use laziness as an excuse anymore. So now my phone is locked, and all my little trouble maker can do is hit the home key and say “ho ho ho!” when a picture of him in Santa’s lap appears.
But what I’ve realized is that if I were to lose my phone and a kind stranger picked it up, or (heaven forbid) I get into an accident and am unconscious, my phone is now inaccessible. My phone is precious to me, and I wouldn’t want an “unkind” stranger to be able to access all the info, passwords, and what-not it contains, but if all a paramedic has is my wallet and locked phone, they aren’t going to have much info.
I was pleased to learn that with Apple iOS 8,
the new Health app has a cool feature that assuages a lot of my worries. Within this app you can create a medical ID that is accessible even when your phone is locked. Let me show you what I mean!
So start by opening the Health app and tapping the “Medical ID” icon in the lower right corner.
Tap “Create Medical ID” and this screen will appear that allows you to enter your chosen information and MY favorite part, select an emergency contact.
When you’re finished, tap “Done” in the upper right hand corner and you will see the summary of your info.
NOW you can check it out in action! Lock your phone and you can see that in the lower left hand corner is the word “Emergency”.
If you select that, this screen will come up, and the words “Medical ID” will appear!
Tapping that will lead to this screen, which would allow the aforementioned kind stranger or emergency medical person to see who you are and provide them with helpful information, as well as a way to contact your loved one.
If they had involved me in the development of this feature, I would have added a way to include information about my children as well, but I still love this feature. I think this would be especially helpful if you had an allergy to a specific medication or a unique blood type. Hopefully this is something that EMTs and ERs know about, and now that you know, we are all a little better prepared!
I don’t know about other Dallas moms, but this mom is addicted to her phone. Well no, addicted is too strong a word, but I will admit that I depend pretty heavily on it. I pretty much pull out my laptop only when absolutely necessary, and even watch more tv/netflix on my phone than on the actual television. Most of the information it contains (calendar, contact info, photos, etc.) is backed up elsewhere, but I can admit that the one time my phone took a plunge in the potty (and did recover, thanks to a couple days in a baggie of rice!) I felt like I was missing an arm.
i just did this and tried to call the emergency contacts that I had listed to see if it would dial. It kept saying “could not complete the call as dialed”
Weird, Sara! I just tried it and my husbands phone rang immediately! Not sure why that would be =/
I added my children’s names and ages under the notes section. I travel without my husband quite frequently and my daughter has a nut allergy. I wanted o make sure that if I am involved in an accident that someone would know not to give her nuts. I also taped a sticky note to the side of her car seat with emergency contact information and her allergy. I know there are stickers out there for this purpose, j just haven’t gotten any yet.
That’s a great idea about the notes section, Lori! I also have emergency info on my carseat and diaper bag – best to be prepared in as many ways as possible!