NowForce determines the best personnel within the closest proximity to deal with an emergency, and contacts them via GPS even if they’re not on duty.
By David Halevi
Organizations and governments spend millions each year on computer-aided dispatch (CAD) systems to get rescue workers, police and firefighters to emergencies quickly and efficiently. But even the most sophisticated contact system is useless unless the rescue worker is on duty with his or her communication device at hand, says Assaf Shafran, founder and CEO of NowForce.
"Instead of tapping the person who is a minute away for help, the dispatcher must track down the closest on-duty person that is reachable – and that person may be 10 minutes away, or more. Meanwhile, seconds count, and a situation that could have been alleviated within a minute or two often has seriously deteriorated after 10 minutes of waiting for a rescue worker," Shafran says.
This so-called "last mile" problem is what NowForce was founded to solve. "Our software-based service allows organizations to easily keep track of emergency workers using existing equipment and protocols. Our service can easily integrate into any existing communications service an organization uses."
NowForce’s solution is based on a web platform that dispatchers can update with a few clicks, and workers in the field can access anytime, anywhere. Using standard GPS included in most cellular and smartphones, the NowForce system records calls and figures out which personnel should be activated to deal with an emergency – based on skill level, specialty and location.
If a child is pulled from a hotel pool unconscious, for example, the NowForce system will instantly scan its database of rescue workers in the organization or jurisdiction, and locate and send out an emergency service call to a CPR-trained emergency medical technician in the closest proximity to the hotel, taking into consideration other assignments, work schedules, etc.
Until now, says Shafran, CAD systems would include not more than a few of those criteria as dispatchers located an emergency worker – and none integrated with always-on GPS technology.
Saving minutes and money
With NowForce, emergency workers can get service calls, and respond to them, much more quickly – saving valuable minutes as well as lives. "We’ve done for emergency response what Salesforce.com has done for corporate marketing departments," says Shafran. Enabling organizations and localities to keep track of their personnel, and using them as lifesaving resources in an effective manner, brings "business success" to rescue organizations.
Jerusalem-based NowForce has been in business for about two and a half years, and its staff of 15 has provided service for tens of thousands of emergency calls during that time for organizations in Israel and the United States. "I am often asked if I have an inspiring story about how NowForce has saved lives, but my answer is that I really don’t – because NowForce is out in the field every day saving lives," says the CEO.
However, Shafran does proudly relate how members of United Hatzalah, the voluntary emergency medical services organization, effectively used the system during the Carmel forest fire in Israel last December. "Hatzalah knew where its people were at all times, thanks to NowForce, and dispatchers were able to locate personnel right away, while members of other rescue teams took long minutes to arrive at specific incidents."
NowForce also saves money, Shafran adds. "We handle the dispatch calls on our servers, automatically sending out messages on not only emergencies, but on scheduling, personnel notification, etc. Until now these messages – thousands per month for many of our clients, if not more – were sent out via SMS, at the expense of the locality or organization. Organizations that send these messages out via NowForce can save a great deal of money."
All the data is securely encoded with the most up-to-date web security technology, and the information is highly available because it is recorded on redundant systems. "We have many stories about how the system helped organizations conduct rescues that they probably would not have been able to accomplish without NowForce," says Shafran. "Every life saved thanks to NowForce is another reason for us to keep doing this work."