Most of us remember the medical emergency system commercials from the 1990s with the elderly lady calling out “Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.” Would you ever receive these types of calls from within your freestall barns if your cows had some type of medical emergency system from which they could call you? Unfortunately, in many older freestall barns, these calls would probably be fairly frequent. Generally, cows prefer to lunge forward when rising from a resting position. Think about how a cow gets up when she is on pasture. Their behavior in freestalls should be similar to this.