In times of disaster, older people suffer more death, injury, financial loss, and stress than younger people. This pattern of neglect can be reduced by improving communications between community elders and agencies providing emergency and disaster relief services. Our long-term objective is to provide an inexpensive, automated voice mail and map-display system called CARE to assist in providing a) notifications and instructions to residents in times of imminent danger, b) identification and evacuation of older residents prior to disasters, c) rapid damage and injury assessment after disasters, and effective communication and outreach for relief agencies during disaster recovery. During non-emergency periods, the CARE voice mail system will provide community wide services such as daily check-up calls for elders and a telephone bulletin board of community events and services. To achieve these goals, we will develop software to integrate microcomputer-based voice mail hardware and government databases for creating computer-displayed, dynamic maps of communities. Awardee's statement of the potential commercial applications of the research: Vertical markets for the CARE voicemail and mapping system include: a) fire departments, b) police departments, c) city, state and federal Office of Emergency Services, d) county sheriff departments, c) federal disaster relief agencies, and f) all private industries that must use and control toxic substances.National Institute on Aging (NIA)
