If you have a medical alert bracelet / tag, and you live in New Zealand, my advice is stay away from the charity MedicAlert NZ.

If you live in a country continually without universal healthcare / socialized medicine, it probably make sense.

If you travel a lot internationally, I'd probably keep rely on self-printed wallet cards, or engraved bracelets / tags.

Some have tattoos with their medical alert information. Ignoring the many obvious problems with a tattoo, you should know that it's easy for first responders to miss even a large medical alert tattoo, as it's unexpected.

Here's what I did

* Googled "medical alert emblem images" to see example images, and then "engraved medical alert OR tag" to find an engraver. Jewellery stores also carry a huge selection.

* on the dog tags, at a minimum put "Wallet card has details" and your NHI number. You may have room for a little medical information like "peanut allergy" OR "type 1 diabetes"

* buy business cards, and make sure it has a background image like a red cross. I have two cards, printed on both sides, including next of kin, lawyer, and even "I have pets at home."

Back to MedicAlert NZ, when the charity was established in 1962, it made sense, because medical records were kept as paper files.

Now that St Johns ambulance drivers have internet connected devices, it seems as anachronistic as an iron lung.

A MedicAlert NZ basic membership only gives a wallet card, with a $45/year renewal. On the positive note, their bracelet or dog tag were more pricey, but are more now in line with jewellery stores.

If you check their marketing video, it mentions the bracelet, and paramedics can "access your on-line medical information immediately."

Well, a NZ paramedic can access your medical information immediately anyhow, as all your medical records are on-line. St John's ambulance can even send photos of your injuries to the hospital before you arrive.

From MedicAlert's FAQ: "All paid up annual members are entitled to free unlimited demographic and medical file updates and should log-in to their personal members account to make free changes to personal information in their ManageMyHealth account. Clinical diagnosis and prescription medications are required to be authenticated by your clinician either electronically or via a certificate"

Then it states "You can ensure your medical record is up to date at any time. MedicAlert will process these updates for you when ever you notify us."

In other words, when your medical conditions change, you need to use MedicAlert's website. Worse when your prescriptions change, you need jump through several hoops to get it updated at MedicAlert. Again unless you live outside of New Zealand, maintaining a separate copy of your medical records and prescriptions seems pretty useless.

Without using MedicAlert NZ, I believe you can make a St John's job a tiny bit easier by having a dog tag with your NHI number. More importantly, for the non-professional public, a few lines of text on your medical ID could save precious seconds. Again I'm somewhat dubious as to the value of a NZ paramedics dialling an 800 number to get medical information, when they already have instant access to your official medical records.

What really annoys me is the constant begging for more money yearly, to the point of misleading and threatening "renewals" even after you cancel.

I registered 2 years ago for an MedicAlert NZ bracelet

I did some test calls to the emergency "break-glass" 800 number on the bracelet. I never was able to talk to a person, and got dumped into voicemail. Perhaps the phone service has improved since then.

The "ManageMyHealth" website was always down. The non-emergency customer service number receptionist would always dump me into someone's voicemail, which no one ever returned. After several weeks and some rather strong language to the receptionist I finally talked to a person, and told them to cancel.

Yet I still receive renewals. Worse I consider the "renewals" misleading.

As I said, I cancelled two years ago. The renewal "invoice" has in tiny print overdue amount of zero dollars. In a font that's ten times bigger it says "Total amount due: $45.00" It goes onto say that it's for advanced services, services yet to be given.

In red and bold: "Government regulations have changed. Non payment of a charities invoice is now required to be treated as a bad debt."