Business Notes CONSUMERISM

It's the first great catchphrase of the '90s: "I've fallen and I can't get up!" The poorly acted but plaintive cry can be heard in ads for Lifecall, one of many personal emergency-response systems that summon medical help at the press of a button. Now that as many as 350,000 of the systems have been sold, they are beginning to draw fire from consumer-advocacy groups that question the marketing of the high-tech hailers and sometimes even the need for them.

The State of Maryland sued a seller of medical-alert units (price: $1,295 each) that became useless junk when the firm failed to pay the company monitoring the equipment. And the American Association of Retired Persons decries the industry's high-pressure sales ploys. According to Myra Herrick, a retired Boston AARP representative, one elderly woman bought a Lifecall system after a four-hour sales pitch because she wanted the salesperson to leave. (Lifecall denies knowledge of the incident.) AARP contends that at $1,000 or more plus monthly monitoring fees, the systems are usually costlier than emergency-response services provided by many local hospitals.