Improving the prioritization of children at the emergency department: Updating the Manchester Triage System using vital signs (original) (raw)
Related papers
2013
Emergency centre (EC) triage should enable rapid prioritisation of paediatric patients to determine how urgently children require care. Triage scales vary and are designed according to their unique context. [1] Most are based on a list of clinical discriminators; some include individual vital signs, while others include early warning scores (EWSs) or symptom-based algorithms. When identifying life-threatening conditions in children, individual vital signs are known to be poor predictors. [2] EWSs are known for their ability to detect physiological changes relating to vital signs. [3] Combining various standardised physiological parameters into an EWS has recently been recognised as a powerful tool in initiating appropriate responses from the initial contact at triage. [4,5] The benefits of an EWS include its objectivity and the fact that an aggregated score is a stronger predictor than individual vital signs and reliance on routinely recorded vital signs. [6] It is acknowledged that accurate triage is compromised when using EWSs without considering clinical discriminators such as purpuric rash and dehydration. [7] In South Africa (SA), the Triage Early Warning Score (TEWS)-consisting of mobility, respiratory rate, pulse, temperature, level of consciousness and presence of traumahas been introduced as part of the South African Triage Scale (SATS), a multilayered approach to risk reduction at triage. Healthcare workers follow a simple algorithm (Appendix 1, available online: http://dx.doi.org/10.7196/SAMJ.6877) and perform triage based on clinical discriminators as well as an age-appropriate composite physiological score, the TEWS. The SATS has four priority levels-emergency, very urgent, urgent and non-urgent, referred to as red, orange, yellow and green, respectively. The SATS has been used as an evidence-based triage tool in ECs across different levels of care in the Western Cape province of SA.
Manchester triage system in paediatric emergency care: prospective observational study
BMJ, 2008
Objective To validate use of the Manchester triage system in paediatric emergency care. Design Prospective observational study. Setting Emergency departments of a university hospital and a teaching hospital in the Netherlands, 2006-7. Participants 17 600 children (aged <16) visiting an emergency department over 13 months (university hospital) and seven months (teaching hospital). Intervention Nurses triaged 16 735/17 600 patients (95%) using a computerised Manchester triage system, which calculated urgency levels from the selection of discriminators embedded in flowcharts for presenting problems. Nurses over-ruled the urgency level in 1714 (10%) children, who were excluded from analysis. Complete data for the reference standard were unavailable in 1467 (9%) children leaving 13 554 patients for analysis. Main outcome measures Urgency according to the Manchester triage system compared with a predefined and independently assessed reference standard for five urgency levels. This reference standard was based on a combination of vital signs at presentation, potentially life threatening conditions, diagnostic resources, therapeutic interventions, and follow-up. Sensitivity, specificity, and likelihood ratios for high urgency (immediate and very urgent) and 95% confidence intervals for subgroups based on age, use of flowcharts, and discriminators. Results The Manchester urgency level agreed with the reference standard in 4582 of 13 554 (34%) children; 7311 (54%) were over-triaged and 1661 (12%) undertriaged. The likelihood ratio was 3.0 (95% confidence interval 2.8 to 3.2) for high urgency and 0.5 (0.4 to 0.5) for low urgency; though the likelihood ratios were lower for those presenting with a medical problem (2.3 (2.2 to 2.5) v 12.0 (7.8 to 18.0) for trauma) and in younger children (2.4 (1.9 to 2.9) at 0-3 months v 5.4 (4.5 to 6.5) at 8-16 years). Conclusions The Manchester triage system has moderate validity in paediatric emergency care. It errs on the safe side, with much more over-triage than under-triage compared with an independent reference standard for urgency. Triage of patients with a medical problem or in younger children is particularly difficult.
Pediatric Quality & Safety, 2020
Introduction: Pediatric in-hospital cardiac arrests and emergent transfers to the pediatric intensive care unit (ICU) represent a serious patient safety concern with associated increased morbidity and mortality. Some institutions have turned to the electronic health record and predictive analytics in search of earlier and more accurate detection of patients at risk for decompensation. Methods: Objective electronic health record data from 2011 to 2017 was utilized to develop an automated early warning system score aimed at identifying hospitalized children at risk of clinical deterioration. Five vital sign measurements and supplemental oxygen requirement data were used to build the Vitals Risk Index (VRI) model, using multivariate logistic regression. We compared the VRI to the hospital's existing early warning system, an adaptation of Monaghan's Pediatric Early Warning Score system (PEWS). The patient population included hospitalized children 18 years of age and younger while being cared for outside of the ICU. This dataset included 158 case hospitalizations (102 emergent transfers to the ICU and 56 "code blue" events) and 135,597 control hospitalizations. Results: When identifying deteriorating patients 2 hours before an event, there was no significant difference between Pediatric Early Warning Score and VRI's areas under the receiver operating characteristic curve at false-positive rates ≤ 10% (pAUC 10 of 0.065 and 0.064, respectively; P = 0.74), a threshold chosen to compare the 2 approaches under clinically tolerable false-positive rates. Conclusions: The VRI represents an objective, simple, and automated predictive analytics tool for identifying hospitalized pediatric patients at risk of deteriorating outside of the ICU setting.
Validity of the Manchester Triage System in emergency care: A prospective observational study
PLOS ONE, 2017
Objectives To determine the validity of the Manchester Triage System (MTS) in emergency care for the general population of patients attending the emergency department, for children and elderly, and for commonly used MTS flowcharts and discriminators across three different emergency care settings. Methods This was a prospective observational study in three European emergency departments. All consecutive patients attending the emergency department during a 1-year study period (2010-2012) were included. Validity of the MTS was assessed by comparing MTS urgency as determined by triage nurses with patient urgency according to a predefined 3-category reference standard as proxy for true patient urgency. Results 288,663 patients were included in the analysis. Sensitivity of the MTS in the three hospitals ranged from 0.47 (95%CI 0.44-0.49) to 0.87 (95%CI 0.85-0.90), and specificity from 0.84 (95%CI 0.84-0.84) to 0.94 (95%CI 0.94-0.94) for the triage of adult patients. In children, sensitivity ranged from 0.65 (95%CI 0.61-0.70) to 0.83 (95%CI 0.79-0.87), and specificity from 0.83 (95%CI 0.82-0.83) to 0.89 (95%CI 0.88-0.90). The diagnostic odds ratio ranged from 13.5 (95%CI 12.1-15.0) to 35.3 (95%CI 28.4-43.9) in adults and from 9.8 (95%CI 6.7-14.5) to 23.8 (95%CI 17.7-32.0) in children, and was lowest in the youngest patients in 2 out of 3 settings and in the oldest patients in all settings. Performance varied considerably between the different emergency departments.
Scandinavian Journal of Trauma, Resuscitation and Emergency Medicine, 2012
Background: Assessment and treatment of the acutely ill patient have improved by introducing systematic assessment and accelerated protocols for specific patient groups. Triage systems are widely used, but few studies have investigated the ability of the triage systems in predicting outcome in the unselected acute population. The aim of this study was to quantify the association between the main component of the Hillerød Acute Process Triage (HAPT) system and the outcome measures; Admission to Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and in-hospital mortality, and to identify the vital signs, scored and categorized at admission, that are most strongly associated with the outcome measures.
Critical Care, 2011
The survival of patients admitted to an emergency department is determined by the severity of acute illness and the quality of care provided. The high number and the wide spectrum of severity of illness of admitted patients make an immediate assessment of all patients unrealistic. The aim of this study is to evaluate a scoring system based on readily available physiological parameters immediately after admission to an emergency department (ED) for the purpose of identification of at-risk patients. Methods: This prospective observational cohort study includes 4,388 consecutive adult patients admitted via the ED of a 960-bed tertiary referral hospital over a period of six months. Occurrence of each of seven potential vital sign abnormalities (threat to airway, abnormal respiratory rate, oxygen saturation, systolic blood pressure, heart rate, low Glasgow Coma Scale and seizures) was collected and added up to generate the vital sign score (VSS). VSS initial was defined as the VSS in the first 15 minutes after admission, VSS max as the maximum VSS throughout the stay in ED. Occurrence of single vital sign abnormalities in the first 15 minutes and VSS initial and VSS max were evaluated as potential predictors of hospital mortality. Results: Logistic regression analysis identified all evaluated single vital sign abnormalities except seizures and abnormal respiratory rate to be independent predictors of hospital mortality. Increasing VSS initial and VSS max were significantly correlated to hospital mortality (odds ratio (OR) 2.80, 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.50 to 3.14, P < 0.0001 for VSS initial ; OR 2.36, 95% CI 2.15 to 2.60, P < 0.0001 for VSS max ). The predictive power of VSS was highest if collected in the first 15 minutes after ED admission (log rank Chi-square 468.1, P < 0.0001 for VSS initial ;,log rank Chi square 361.5, P < 0.0001 for VSS max ). Conclusions: Vital sign abnormalities and VSS collected in the first minutes after ED admission can identify patients at risk of an unfavourable outcome.
Manchester Triage System: assessment in an emergency hospital service
Revista Brasileira de Enfermagem
Objectives: to analyze demographic data, clinical profile and outcomes of patients in emergency services according to Manchester Triage System’s priority level. Methods: a cross-sectional, analytical study, carried out with 3,624 medical records. For statistical analysis, the Chi-Square Test was used. Results: white individuals were more advanced in age. In the red and white categories, there was a higher percentage of men when compared to women (p=0.0018) and higher prevalence of personal history. Yellow priority patients had higher percentage of pain (p<0.0001). Those in red category had a higher frequency of altered vital signs, external causes, and death outcome. There was a higher percentage of exams performed and hospitalization in the orange category. Blue priority patients had a higher percentage of non-specific complaints and dismissal after risk stratification. Conclusions: a higher percentage of altered vital signs, number of tests performed, hospitalization and death ...
A validity study of the rapid emergency Triage and treatment system for children
Scandinavian Journal of Trauma, Resuscitation and Emergency Medicine
Background The Scandinavian Rapid Emergency Triage and Treatment System-pediatric (RETTS-p) is a reliable triage system that includes both assessment of vital parameters and a systematic approach to history and symptoms. In Scandinavia, the system is used in most pediatric emergency departments (PED). We aimed to study the validity of RETTS-p. Methods We conducted a study based on triage priority ratings from all children assessed in 2013 and 2014 to the PED at St. Olavs University Hospital Trondheim, Norway. Patients were assigned one of four priority ratings, based on the RETTS-p systematic evaluation of individual disease manifestations and vital parameter measurements. In the absence of a gold-standard for true disease severity, we assessed whether priority ratings were associated with 3 proxy variables: 1) hospitalization to the wards (yes vs. no), 2) length of hospital stay (≤ mean vs. > mean, and 3) referral to pediatric intensive care (yes vs. no). We further compared pri...