EaseAlert Earns Patent for Heart-Smart Alerting System
Tonev (left) and Richardson (right) holding EaseAlert’s patent while wearing the EaseAlert’s proprietary wearables.
EaseAlert, a trailblazer in heart-smart Fire Fighter Alerting Systems (FFAS), has earned a utility patent (US Patent No. 11,109,213) for its game-changing FFAS. Cofounders, Elezar Tonev and Blake Richardson began EaseAlert’s journey in 2019 with the goal of modernizing alerting methods for emergency responders. That jarring audible alarm notifies emergency responders multiple times every day and night, regardless of the type of 9-1-1 call they respond to. These repeated alerts can put emergency responders at a higher risk of suffering a heart attack.
Early design of the EaseAlert wearable.
After researching the health effects of loud audible alarms, Richardson and Tonev looked for alternative alerting solutions that would remain effective in notifying first responders the health detriments of audible alarms. That is when they realized that they could accomplish this using tactile alerts.
As referenced in the 2018 study by Korres et al, tactile alerts are more likely to wake someone up (greater arousal) and more likely to do so in a pleasant manner (positive valence) than audible alarms.
Shortly after this discovery, EaseAlert began investigating if tactile alerting products had been used in the fire service before and if so, had been successful. This investigation, paired with an extensive patent search, reinforced that a tactile alerting method was novel and untouched in this industry. That is when EaseAlert began developing its first-generation wearable device that would deliver a tactile vibration to the wrist of each first responder when a station is dispatched to an emergency.
“A lot of the credit for EaseAlert’s robust alerting system goes to Mike Jordan from RDM Innovation. Mike’s electrical engineering expertise and drive to continually improve EaseAlert’s system has helped us bring groundbreaking innovation to many emergency responders, including my dad.”
Blake Richardson, EaseAlert Cofounder & CEO
Further development and firefighter feedback brought forth critical innovation that catapulted EaseAlert ahead, including the invention of the BunkAlert — a personal bedside alerting device that shines a low-impact red light to notify responders of a call.
EaseAlert’s first Central Command Unit (CCU).
Continued advancements in materials, communications, and connectivity improved durability, increased range, and made for easy implementation with universal station connectivity.
In March of 2020, EaseAlert was issued its utility patent for its firefighter pre-alerting system. With the second-generation system complete, EaseAlert is well on its way to introducing true heart-smart alerting to first responders everywhere.
Reference:
Korres, G., Jensen, C. B., Park, W., Bartsch, C., & Eid, M. (2018). A vibrotactile alarm system for Pleasant Awakening. IEEE Transactions on Haptics, 11(3), 357–366. https://doi.org/10.1109/toh.2018.2804952