The Outreach Trauma Program: a model for survival of the academic trauma center

A Multicenter Performance Improvement Program Uses Rural Trauma Filters for Benchmarking: An Evaluation of the Findings

Colorado requires Level III and IV trauma centers to conduct a formal performance improvement program (PI), but provides limited support for program development. Trauma program managers and coordinators in rural facilities rarely have experience in the development or management of a PI program. As a result, rural trauma centers often face challenges in evaluating trauma outcomes adequately. Through a multidisciplinary outreach program, our Trauma System worked with a group of rural trauma centers to identify and define seven specific PI filters based on key program elements of rural trauma centers. This retrospective observational project sought to develop and examine these PI filters so as to enhance the review and evaluation of patient care. The project included 924 trauma patients from eight Level IV and one Level III trauma centers. Seven PI filters were retrospectively collected and analyzed by quarter in 2016: prehospital managed airway for patients with a Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) score of less than 9; adherence to trauma team activation criteria; evidence of physician team leader presence within 20 min of activation; patient with a GCS score less than 9 in the emergency department (ED): intubated in less than 20 min; ED length of stay (LOS) less than 4 hr from patient arrival to transfer; adherence to admission criteria; documentation of GCS on arrival, discharge, or with change of status. There was a significantly increasing compliance trend toward appropriate documentation of GCS (p trend < .001) and a significantly decreasing compliance trend for ED LOS of less than 4 hr (p trend = .04). Moving forward, these data will be used to develop compliance thresholds, to identify areas for improvement, and create corrective action plans as necessary.

The integral role of the plastic surgeon at a level I trauma center

The role of plastic surgery in urban level I trauma centers in the United States has been largely undefined, despite the undeniable historical involvement of plastic surgery in reconstruction of posttraumatic defects. To explore and define this role, case data were prospectively collected during a 29-month period following initiation of a full-time plastic surgery position at an established urban level I trauma center. Referring and/or interacting surgical service, anatomical area of interest, and procedure data were tabulated. A total of 1009 operative reports comprising 1104 procedures were recorded. The most common interacting surgical services were orthopedics and general/trauma surgery; however, interaction occurred with a total of 10 surgical specialties. The upper extremity was the most common anatomical area operated on followed by head and neck, lower extremity, trunk, urogenital, and breast. A wide variety of procedures were performed in each anatomical area, demonstrating the broad scope of reconstructive surgery practiced in a trauma setting. Three hundred and twenty-four procedures involved expertise in microsurgery, flaps, and burn or frostbite care. Additional procedures commonly performed demonstrated considerable overlap with other fields of surgical specialization. This overlap in skills proved advantageous in distribution of facial trauma call and hand surgery coverage. Data presented in this study reinforce the idea that plastic surgery is a specialty defined by concept rather than anatomical area, and also demonstrate a significant role for plastic surgeons in a level I trauma center.