Addressing the media and community members at Pilgrim Senior Center yesterday, Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian announced the city’s participation in a new program to help locate citizens who suffer from Alzheimer’s disease and other cognitive disorders that may cause them to wander.

The city has entered into a partnership with MissingPatient.com. The program is a hybrid between the national “Amber Alert” system for finding missing children and the LoJack stolen vehicle recovery system. It utilizes a database of registered patients and G.P.S. technology.

Avedisian said although the city has improved its services for senior citizens, especially those with dementia, “you can lull yourself into the belief” that services can’t be further improved.

Avedisian said joint service with MissingPatient.com, which is provided at no cost to the city, is one example of a service to senior citizens that could be improved. “It really has been compared to an amber alert,” Avedisian said. “It gives a mechanism; to have information that’s trackable.”

Rhode Island resident Timothy Holmgren founded MissingPatient.com, and said it enables caregivers, family members, medical professionals and police to find missing loved ones who happen to be cognitively impaired by conditions such as dementia or autism.

Holmgren said the program takes an active approach to what’s expected to become a growing dilemma.

Sixty percent of the estimated 35 million people worldwide who have dementia will wander away at some point. MissingPatient.com helps to expedite the process of finding and returning these patients to their homes, Holmgren said.

It has been adopted in several states nationwide, including Florida, Texas, North Carolina and Ohio. So far, about 1,200 people have been registered. Warwick is the first municipality to adopt it.

MissingPatient.com’s program works first by registering patients into a database. Registration is free, Holmgren said. Caregivers and family members supply photographs and other identifying information such as a name, hair and eye color, height, weight, race, other distinguishing characteristics and medical history. Caregivers can also provide other information in the registration, including places the patients typically go to, and clothes they usually wear.

If a patient is believed to be missing, Holmgren recommended caretakers call 911.

The police, who will have access to the MissingPatient.com database on the laptops equipped in their patrol cars, will initiate the alert that there is a possible missing person.

The alert will include typical police search contacts, as well as the contacts provided to MissingPatient.com.

These contacts could include neighbors and friends, in addition to family. If an alert is issued, these contacts would receive text messages, e-mails or faxes stating so. In so doing, a person thought missing may actually be in the care of one of the contacts thereby eliminating any need of a search.

Holmgren said beginning in November or December, MissingPatient.com will offer caretakers “an additional layer of comfort,” a premium service allowing them to track their patient using G.P.S. enabled bracelets.

In the premium program, the G.P.S. tracker will alert caretakers when their patient has left what are identified to be their “safety zones,” and a circle of immediate contacts will instantly receive text messages, e-mails and faxes.

While registration with the basic system is free, the premium G.P.S. service is not. A tracker costs $170 and service costs $11 a month.

Holmgren, who was already working for Life Prints, a company that has developed a system for locating missing children, said the impetus for MissingPatient.com came from his own family. He has relatives afflicted by dementia.

Although there were already programs in place to help track down missing people with cognitive disorders, Holmgren said he thought “there could be a lot better system.” Warwick Police Department Major Michael Babula said wandering and other issues surrounding those with dementia and other cognitive disorders are issues “almost everyone can agree on.”

Police officers receiving 911 calls that report people missing “seldom know whether or not they’re really missing. But now officers will be able to look at their laptops and know that it’s a real case,” he added.

“This can make a difference, between life or death,” Babula said. “We welcome this, we look forward to it.”

MissingPatient.com municipal liaison Tim Colgan, who is also a retired captain of the Warwick Police Department, said in the past, the department would receive weekly or monthly calls that a person with dementia had gone missing.

Colgan said he felt the MissingPatient.com system would save the police department “a lot of resources and also help it to allot resources” where they need to be, should a dementia patient go missing for more than 24 hours.

“It does work,” Colgan said. “Within 10 seconds of sending out the alert, you get the text message.”

Dottie Santagata, director of day services at Cornerstone Adult Services, said although the program was not specific to her organization it was important to “try to stay abreast of new technologies...anything that might be on the horizon.”

“We will be letting our families know of the new program,” Santagata said.

Warwick residents who wish to register their patients and loved ones can do so online at MissingPatient.com or at the Pilgrim Senior Center, located 27 Pilgrim Parkway.