MDA launches new service for the hearing impaired

Magen David Adom emergency services announced Sunday it has launched a new service for the hearing impaired, allowing them to call for help by texting MDA dispatch.

Text messages received at Magen David Adom's central dispatch will be immediately displayed on a plasma screen along with a vocal alert to on-call staff. The new service will also allow MDA staff to send a text message back, informing the original sender that help is on the way.

Some 650,000 people living in Israel are hearing impaired. In accordance with the instructions of Magen David Adom's Chief Medical Officer, Eli Bin, the new text service will be taking over for the fax service MDA introduced a decade ago.

The text service, like the fax service before it, is considered a breakthrough in emergency services' accessibility.

The new service is available nationwide at 972-52-7000101. Magen David Adom asks that all text messages include – to the best of the caller's ability – their name, address, and nature of emergency.

Meital Yasur-Beit Or contributed to this report