Emergency medical card for an aging parent: what to include

October 14, 2026

From Centis, a free care notebook you talk to. Everything in this guide works with pen and paper too.

If something happens while your parent is out, or while you’re not there, the people helping can only work with what they find. A paramedic, a nurse at the front desk or a neighbour may need to know who your parent is, who to call and what’s already known about their health, before anyone who knows them arrives.

An emergency medical card puts those answers in their wallet. It’s a list of information to have to hand, not instructions for an emergency. In one, call 911.

Fill it in with your parent if you can. It’s their information, and they decide what goes on it. The page prints as the card itself: cut it out, fold it in half with the writing outside, and it fits in a wallet.

What should be on an emergency medical card?

The card has two halves. The front says who they are and who to call. The back holds what’s known about their health, in the words their doctors used.

Front: who they are

Full name and date of birth
Two people to call: name, how they’re related, phone number
Main doctor: name and phone number
How they communicate: the language they speak, hearing aids or glasses, anything that makes talking with someone new harder
The date the card was last updated

Back: their health

Allergies to medicines, foods or anything else, and the reaction as it was recorded
Conditions, as their doctors named them
Medications: name, dose and how often. If the list won’t fit, write “Full list folded behind this card” and keep the full list with it
Devices and implants: a pacemaker, an insulin pump, hearing aids
Blood type, if it’s on a record you have
Where their care documents are kept, such as an advance directive or healthcare power of attorney if they have one, and who holds a copy

The card is the short version. The aging parents checklist covers everything worth keeping in one place, and the card is what a stranger reads first.

The card

Print this page and you get the card alone, in black and white. Cut along the dashed line, fold it in half on the middle line with the writing outside, and fill it in by hand.

Emergency information

Name

Date of birth

Call first

Or call

Main doctor

Language, hearing, sight

Updated

Health

Allergies and reaction

Conditions

Medications

Devices, implants

Blood type

Care documents kept at

Cut along the dashed line, then fold on the middle line with the writing outside.

What to leave off

Anyone who finds the wallet can read the card, so keep it to what a stranger helping them needs.

Numbers that open accounts: Social Security number, bank or card numbers, PINs, passwords, alarm codes.
Insurance details. The insurance card is usually in the wallet already. Ready.gov suggests making copies of Medicare, Medicaid and other insurance cards.
Anything you’re not sure of. Leave the line blank until you can check it against a pill bottle, a letter or a record.

Where to keep it

In their wallet, next to their ID.
A copy for each person named on it, and a photo on your own phone.
A copy at home, somewhere a visitor would see it, such as on the fridge.

Put it on their phone too

Both iPhone and Android phones can show medical details and emergency contacts on the lock screen, without the passcode. The card covers a phone that’s flat or left at home; the phone covers a wallet that isn’t with them.

iPhone: in the Health app, tap Summary, then their picture, then Medical ID. Fill in the fields and turn on Show When Locked. Apple says Share During Emergency Call also sends the Medical ID when they call or text emergency services.
Android: in the Safety app, tap Your info, then Medical information and Emergency contacts. Under Emergency info access, choose Show when locked. Menu names vary between phones.

Google notes that anyone who picks up the phone can see this information, so the same rule applies: only what a stranger helping them needs.

Keeping it current

A card with last year’s medications on it answers the question wrongly. A few habits keep it right.

Date it every time you change it.
Update it the same day something changes: a new medication, a dose change, a new doctor, a new allergy.
Replace every copy, and the phone, so only one version is going around.
Reprint it when it’s too crossed out to read.

The card goes out of date when something changes and nobody writes it down. Centis keeps that part for you. You talk for thirty seconds after a visit, and it keeps a dated record of what changed in your own words, newest first. When you sit down to update the card, the changes since last time are already there. It’s free, and you can use it on your own without an account.

Centis isn’t for emergencies. In one, call 911.