Listed in *AARP® The Magazine Online Caregivers Resource Guide in 2003 as a resource for Personal Alarms
Listed in *AARP®'s "My Generation" Magazine in 2002 as a resource for Personal Alarms
Take the time to read everyone's brochure and make an intelligent decision.
A Medical Alert helps seniors when they can't reach the phone for help.
The importance of a medical alert and a medical alert service for those seniors living alone, or with family, are known to provide "Peace of Mind" for all concerned.
When an elderly person finds themselves in an awkward or dangerous situation be it medical, fire or an intruder, having a help button to push when they can't reach the phone is crucial.
Jeff Miller talks about Comparing Medical Alert Systems
Imagine that yourself, or your loved one, has fallen...how will they get up? Maybe they went out to get the mail or put out the trash. Maybe they are working in their garden, basement or their garage, how do they get help when they need it most and can't reach the phone for help?
Push the help button and our National Monitoring Center will know within seconds that they are in trouble. Immediately we will attempt to speak to them through the speaker box placed in their home. If they don't respond, we will call their home phone first just in case they did not hear our booming speaker box. Maybe they have poor hearing and even aren't wearing their hearing aids.
If they don't answer the phone, our operators will immediately call your local 911 first responders and advise them of the person's name, location and anything they may have told us. Help will be on the way.
It's possible that all they want is you or a neighbor called, then that is exactly what we will do.
Lastly, we start to call a list of responders that you have predesignated to call.
What we suggest you do next is to Read Our Posts about the situations and solutions you or your loved ones face everyday. It has very valuable commentary from our Senior Safety Team Members.
Or if you wish to see our Price Plans check them out. Or just meander around our site as you see fit.
We take great pride in our Customer Service, often we spend more than an hour helping our clients out over the phone...we take all the time they need. It's clear to us that as age creeps up on us, sometimes we need a little more caring help...someone to listen to you.
We Care!
Jeffrey C. Miller, CEO
Medical Alert Issues
Jeffrey C. Miller a pioneer of the medical alarm industry for 29 years speaks from his heart.
At sometime in life, whether it's your mom, dad, aunt, uncle, family, or a friend... life can become difficult.
Mom could fall and not be able to call for help. Aunt Tillie's arthritis could flare up not allowing her to get out of the tub. Dad could slip in the shower and not have a Button to push for help. Uncle Joe could have a heart attack and not have a Button to push to get help.
Most of our family members, or us, wait until an emergency occurs before getting a medical alert device. Some refuse to use a system even after their first incident and therefore have the same fall, heart attack, stroke, breathing difficulty... or whatever kind of threat... yet again... with no way to summon help...because the can't reach the phone for help to dial 911.
Here's the problem. Once a senior has fallen and waited hours for help to find them...they lose a portion of their self-confidence. By the time someone has fallen multiple times without immediate help...they start to become a different person...they become frail and sometimes afraid.
The best time to protect a loved one with a medical alert device is prior to any problem. I have become a young senior myself and I now stay safe with my own Button. It's the smart thing to do.
A loved one can remain living independently in their own home far longer by having a Button to push that will get them help when they need it most.
- Do they own their own monitoring center or do they contract out?
There are great privately owned monitoring centers and there are great contracted monitoring centers. There are lousy private and contracted monitoring centers. What you should really be trying to find out, are they a good certified monitoring center.
Here's the rub. Everyone is making claims of why they are great. As a civilian in this industry can you tell who is telling the truth?
- What quality are your operators?
Your monitoring Center should be committed to providing the highest quality customer service possible. This includes a comprehensive customer service training program designed to teach the operators how to handle all situations. This program must include a quality control system such as operator evaluations and daily performance reviews. All operators should have the calls recorded and reviewed on a daily basis.
- How are their operators trained?
Your monitoring center should have a comprehensive training program designed specifically for medial alarms. This includes a certification for all operators who handle Medical accounts. The training program teaches the operator how to handle all medical situations. The goal is to ensure that medical emergencies are handled at the highest level of importance and quality. If someone needs medical assistance the operators must have the confidence and training to handle all emergency situations with the utmost accuracy.
- How many operators do you have?
Does it really matter? Your monitoring center should have systems in place to allow controlled growth. This should include a Call Management System (CMS) that monitors the call flow traffic and projects staffing needs. The monitoring center will use this data to project the staffing need for each shift based on time intervals. Heavy traffic periods should have the staffing to control it.
- How is your monitoring center certified?
Our National Monitoring Center is UL listed, FM approved and Department of Defense cleared. These agencies certify our monitoring center and ensure through annual inspections that the monitoring center meet stringent requirements. An example of these requirements are to ensure full redundancy of all systems which means that if a system fails a back-up system is implemented immediately and automatically. Back up power generators and UPS systems are another requirement that provides the monitoring center with the ability to automatically transfer from city power to generator power automatically. There are numerous requirements that a monitoring center must meet in order to hold all three of these certifications. Monitoring centers that can achieve all three of these listings are best prepared for any situation and can ensure that they will not go down and will be available to handle your emergency when you need them no matter what the circumstances are. Very, very few centers in the United States meet all three certifications. I would never use a non UL Listed monitoring center as a bare minimum certification.
- Are your operators always there to answer the phone?
Our's is a Two-Ring Commitment: Does your monitoring center answer all in-bound calls in two rings or less and by a live person no matter how busy they are?
Our monitoring center has service goals and service commitments that govern how we are performing. We have goals that are monitored on a daily basis?
We always have Spanish speaking operators available.
It is confusing to decide between systems...and there are new players on the block claiming to have been around forever. They have also opened multiple sites under multiple names, making a variety of claims.
If companies say they can do things that no other company can do...I would question this. Most good companies have equal equipment and have good service. It's not about the equipment. It's about the follow-up service. There is a lot of work for a medical alarm company to do to make sure all bases are covered.
Reviewing the equipment is easy...reviewing how a company handles all situations is difficult. It requires an extensive test suite be set up to that judge all systems fairly. We are in the process of having a test run at this time.
We provide service in all 50 states in all cities and towns...since we are so often asked "Where do you have clients?"...we've included some of the cities we have concentrations of medical alarm clients