(Radio Iowa) – A University of Iowa professor has developed an app to help first responders communicate with patients who can’t speak during emergencies. Krista Davidson, a U-I professor of communication sciences and disorders, says the app is called RescueVoice, which she says has the potential to be life-changing. Davidson says, “It’s a speech-generating app and it’s designed specifically for first responders and medical personnel to help them effectively communicate with individuals who have limited or no speech, or maybe who are unable to speak because of a current medical event.”

The innovative app can be used in all sorts of settings, including emergency responders, medical workers in E-Rs, nursing homes, and schools, so helpers can communicate quickly with patients. “You can press buttons, tap-to-talk icons. It has symbols on it, but it also has text-to-speech capability where you could type and it will speak what you type,” Davidson says. “We have vocabulary related to symptoms, pain, body parts and we also have a Spanish option now where the text is in Spanish but it will speak English to the first responder.”

This RescueVoice screen enables a patient to show pain levels for various body parts.

She hopes to include more languages in future versions of the app, as well as to make it available for smartphones, as it’s now just for tablets. Davidson developed the app after hearing feedback from first responders. “I don’t think it’s necessarily something that’s needed constantly every day, but I think it can make a real big impact when you do need it,” Davidson says. “When that situation arises where someone’s unable to communicate, it could be life-changing in those moments.”

The app costs $9.99 in the Apple and Android app stores, as Davidson says it was very costly to produce. Her initial funding to create it came from grants and local non-profits like the Solon Lions Club and the North Liberty Optimists. She also appealed to the U-I’s entrepreneur center. “They have these contests like pitch contests, and to me, it’s very much like Shark Tank. You go and you have to pitch your idea to these folks and then they select a winner. Lots of people compete. In one of them, I got second place and won $10,000 and that is how I was able to create the Spanish option in the app.”

An Ohio children’s hospital is among the first users of RescueVoice.

https://rescuevoice.uiowa.edu/