The number information sources that must be monitored to keep up to date on Emergency Management is truly staggering. From federal sources like FEMA and the DHS, to state and local government, international agencies, bio-surveillance and weather tracking, managing incoming information can become a full time job.

There are a number of online tools to help you organize this information, like alerts that come into your email box or phone, RSS feeds that allow you to subscribe to information sources and even some podcasts that are starting to emerge - but the recent upgrade to the Google home page called iGoogle allows you to combine all of these sources into one convenient view. iGoogle lets you subscribe to news feeds, allows you to add 'gadgets' (like weather tracking) and even lets you make your own custom gadgets. Let's walk through setting up your own iGoogle page and get you one step closer to managing your incoming flood of Emergency Management information.

Step 1 - get a Google account
Google accounts are free and easy to configure. Go to google.com and click Sign in in the upper right corner. If you already have an account, sign in. If not, click on create an account now, and complete the registration process.

Step 2 - Adding Content to your page
Go to your new iGoogle page (you will have to verify if this is a new account) and you will be presented with a clean slate. Let's get started by adding some content. Click on Add stuff » and search in the news section on the keyword 'emergency'. About half way down the first page there is a news feed from the Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. Add this feed. Now go back to your home page to see the news feed content.

Step 3 - Add Custom Feeds
In addition to searching for feeds from the google directory, you can also add any RSS feed to your page. From your iGoogle home, click on Add stuff » and instead of doing a search, click the Add by URL link to the right of the search box. Now enter the address of the feed and click Add. You can try this out by cutting and pasting the address of the Medworxx feed on Emergency Management news from the box below

Step 4 - Add Gadgets
From your iGoogle home page, click on add stuff » one more time. Instead of a news feed, this time we will be adding a gadget. A gadget is a piece of code that is managed by the iGoogle home page that gives you a bit more functionality than a simple news feed. Let's pick the weather gadget at the top of the list. Click on Add it now and then return to the iGoogle home page. On your home page you now have a new box for weather updates. Click on the Set Up button to customize the feed by entering your country and then picking a city and clicking add. You can add more than one area to monitor. If you want to change the settings of the gadget at a later date, click on the down arrow in the top right corner of the gadget box.

Step 4 - Keep on customizing
Now you have three content portals on your page. You can drag them around to re-order them into one of three columns. You can also add a number of other content feeds and gadgets to the page to make it a dynamic portal for emergency management news tracking. Some very useful information can be included on your page from:

• Agency news feeds (CDC, FEMA, HHS, DHS, ...)
• Health care News
• A gadget for Gmail (great for reading news alerts and notifications in real time)
• podcasts

See what other useful sources of information you can add to your iGoogle Emergency Management News Dashboard.