[Analysis of a differentiated resuscitation room activation at a national trauma center]

BACKGROUND

In order to continue to efficiently provide both personnel-intensive and resource-intensive care to severely injured patients, some hospitals have introduced individually differentiated systems for resuscitation room treatment. The aim of this study was to evaluate the concept of the A and B classifications in terms of practicability, indications, and potential complications at a national trauma center in Bavaria.

METHODS

In a retrospective study, data from resuscitation room trauma patients in the year 2020 were collected. The assignment to A and B was made by the prehospital emergency physician. Parameters such as the injury severity score (ISS), Glasgow outcome scale (GOS), upgrade rate, and the indication criteria according to the S3 guidelines were recorded. Statistical data comparisons were made using t‑tests, χ2-tests, or Mann-Whitney U‑tests.

RESULTS

A total of 879 resuscitation room treatments (A 473, B 406) met the inclusion criteria. It was found that 94.5% of resuscitation room A cases had physician accompaniment, compared to 48% in resuscitation room B assignments. In addition to significantly lower ISS scores (4.1 vs. 13.9), 29.8% of B patients did not meet the treatment criteria defined in the S3 guidelines. With a low upgrade rate of 4.9%, 98% of B patients had a GOS score of 4 or 5.

CONCLUSION

The presented categorization is an effective and safe way to manage the increasing number of resuscitation room alerts in a resource-optimized manner.

Can the use of whole-body CT be reduced in cases of kinetic-based polytrauma patients without a clinical severity criterion? A bi-center retrospective study

OBJECTIVE

To identify clinical and biological criteria predictive of significant traumatic injury in only kinetic-based polytrauma patients without clinical severity criteria. To propose a decisional algorithm to assist the emergency doctor in deciding whether or not to perform a WBCT in the above population.

METHODS

Retrospective bi-center study. 1270 patients with high velocity trauma without clinical severity criteria, for whom a WBCT was performed in 2017, were included. Patients with hemodynamic, respiratory or neurological severity criterion or those requiring pre-hospital resuscitation measures were excluded. Our primary endpoint was the identification of a significant lesion, i.e. any lesion that led to hospitalization > 24 h for monitoring or medico-surgical treatment. Data collected were age, sex, mechanism of injury, Glasgow Coma Scale score, number of symptomatic body regions, blood alcohol level, and neutrophil count.

RESULTS

Multivariate analysis found independent predictors of significant injury: fall > 5 m (OR: 14.36; CI: 2.3-283.4; p = 0.017), Glasgow score = 13 or 14 (OR: 4.40; CI:1.30-18.52; p = 0.027), presence of 2 symptomatic body regions (OR: 10.21; CI: 4.66-23.72; p = 0.05), positive blood alcohol level (OR: 2.81; CI: 1.13-7.33; p = 0.029) and neutrophilic leukocytosis (OR: 8.76; CI: 3.94-21.27; p = 0.01). A composite clinico-biological endpoint predictive of the absence of significant lesion was identified using a Classification and Regression Tree: number of symptomatic regions < 2, absence of Neutrophilic leukocytosis and negative blood alcohol concentration.

CONCLUSION

A simple triage algorithm was created with the objective of identifying, in high velocity trauma without clinical severity criteria, those without significant traumatic injury.

Utilization of trauma nurse screening procedure for triage of the injured patient

PURPOSE

The treatment of trauma patients requires significant hospital resources. Numerous protocols exist to triage the injured patient and determine the level of care they may require. The purpose of this work is to describe an institutional trauma nurse screening procedure and to evaluate its effectiveness in triaging injured patients.

METHODS

This retrospective study was conducted at a large, tertiary trauma center from January to June 2021. Patients were assessed by trauma nurse clinicians (TNC) utilizing a standardized screening process to determine suitability for trauma activation. If the patient did not meet activation criteria, they were sent to the main Emergency Department for evaluation and treatment. Patients could be activated later by the emergency physician. The primary variables of interest were number of activations after initial "rule out," injury severity score (ISS) for patients who were activated, mechanism of injury, and disposition.

RESULTS

A total of 1874 TNC screenings were performed. Of these, 1449 (77%) patients did not meet trauma activation criteria. Only 41 (2.8%) patients initially ruled out were later activated by the emergency physician and admitted for treatment of injuries. The average ISS of all activated patients was 9 ± 6. Thirty-six patients had an ISS ≤ 15, four between 16 and 25, and only one patient had an ISS > 25. Twenty-seven patients were admitted to the ward, five went to step-down units, and five required intensive care unit admission. Four patients required operative intervention for their injuries.

CONCLUSION

These results suggest that nursing screening protocols can be safe, effective tools for triage of trauma patients.

Prehospital triage of trauma patients before and after implementation of a regional triage guideline

INTRODUCTION

Severely injured trauma patients have a considerable mortality rate. One way to reduce the mortality is to ensure optimal triage. The American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma has since 1986 made guidelines for the triage of trauma patients. These guidelines formed the basis, when the capital region of Denmark implemented a regional trauma triage guideline on February 15th 2016. It is uncertain how the implementation of the regional trauma triage guideline has influenced the triage of trauma patients. The aim of this study was to investigate the changes in admission pattern of trauma patients in the entire region after the implementation of the regional trauma triage guideline. We hypothesized that there would be a reduction in the proportion of trauma patients admitted to the trauma center after the implementation of the regional trauma triage guideline.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

In this observational cohort study with one-year follow-up, we used a national patient registry in Denmark. We identified trauma patients three years before and three years after the implementation of a new regional trauma triage guideline. The primary outcome was the proportion of trauma patients triaged to the regional trauma center. Secondary outcomes were: 30-day and one-year mortality, overtriage, and undertriage.

RESULTS

We found a significant reduction in the proportion of trauma patients triaged to the trauma center from 2115/5951 (35.5%) to 1970/5857 (33.6%), after the implementation of the regional trauma triage guideline, the difference being 1.9% (95% CI: 0.19 to 3.6%); P = 0.03. Further, a significant reduction of overtriage from 15.4% to 9.5% (difference 5.9% with 95% CI of 3.8 to 7.9%) was found. No significant changes in undertriage, 30-day or one-year mortality were found (1.07% vs 0.97%, 4.3% vs 4.5%, and 15.7% vs 16.6% respectively).

CONCLUSION

A significant decrease in the proportion of trauma patients admitted to the trauma center was found after implementation of a new regional trauma triage guideline. A reduction was seen in overtriage, but no changes were found in undertriage and both short-term and long-term mortality remained unchanged.

Secondary overtriage in a pediatric level one trauma center

BACKGROUND

Previous studies have explored under- and overtriage, and the means by which to optimize these rates. Few have examined secondary overtriage (SO), or the unnecessary transfer of minimally injured patients to higher level trauma centers. We sought to determine the incidence and impact of SO in our pediatric level one trauma center.

METHODS

We performed a retrospective analysis of all trauma activations at our institution from 2015 through 2017. SO was defined as transferred patients who required neither PICU admission nor an operation, with ISS ≤ 9 and LOS ≤ 24 h. We compared SO patients against all trauma activation transfers, and against similar non-transferred patients.

RESULTS

We identified 1789 trauma activations, including 766 (42.8%) transfers. Of the transfers, 335 (43.7%) met criteria for SO. Compared to other transfers, SO patients had a shorter mean travel distance (52.9 v 58.1 mi; p = 0.02). Compared to similar patients transported from the trauma scene, SO patients were more likely to be admitted (52.2% v 29.2%; p < 0.001), with longer inpatient stay and greater hospital charges.

CONCLUSIONS

SO represents an underrecognized burden to trauma centers which could be minimized to improve resource allocation. Future research should evaluate trauma activation criteria for transferred pediatric patients.

The advanced machine learner XGBoost did not reduce prehospital trauma mistriage compared with logistic regression: a simulation study

Background

Accurate prehospital trauma triage is crucial for identifying critically injured patients and determining the level of care. In the prehospital setting, time and data are often scarce, limiting the complexity of triage models. The aim of this study was to assess whether, compared with logistic regression, the advanced machine learner XGBoost (eXtreme Gradient Boosting) is associated with reduced prehospital trauma mistriage.

Methods

We conducted a simulation study based on data from the US National Trauma Data Bank (NTDB) and the Swedish Trauma Registry (SweTrau). We used categorized systolic blood pressure, respiratory rate, Glasgow Coma Scale and age as our predictors. The outcome was the difference in under- and overtriage rates between the models for different training dataset sizes.

Results

We used data from 813,567 patients in the NTDB and 30,577 patients in SweTrau. In SweTrau, the smallest training set of 10 events per free parameter was sufficient for model development. XGBoost achieved undertriage rates in the range of 0.314–0.324 with corresponding overtriage rates of 0.319–0.322. Logistic regression achieved undertriage rates ranging from 0.312 to 0.321 with associated overtriage rates ranging from 0.321 to 0.323. In NTDB, XGBoost required the largest training set size of 1000 events per free parameter to achieve robust results, whereas logistic regression achieved stable performance from a training set size of 25 events per free parameter. For the training set size of 1000 events per free parameter, XGBoost obtained an undertriage rate of 0.406 with an overtriage of 0.463. For logistic regression, the corresponding undertriage was 0.395 with an overtriage of 0.468.

Conclusion

The under- and overtriage rates associated with the advanced machine learner XGBoost were similar to the rates associated with logistic regression regardless of sample size, but XGBoost required larger training sets to obtain robust results. We do not recommend using XGBoost over logistic regression in this context when predictors are few and categorical.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12911-021-01558-y.

Epidemiology of trauma admissions in a level 1 trauma center in Northern Italy: a nine-year study

The aim of this study was to analyze the results of 9 years of trauma care and data collection in a level 1 urban trauma center in Northern Italy. Overall, 6065 patients have been included in the study; the number of patients managed yearly has doubled between 2011 and 2019. This rise mostly involved patients with injury severity score (ISS) < 16. Most injuries (94%) were blunt. Road traffic accidents, especially involving motorcycles, were the most common cause of injury. Self-inflicted injuries were responsible for less than 5% of trauma but they were severe in 56% of cases. The median age was 38 and it remained constant over the years; 43% of patients had 14-39 years of age. Different characteristics and patterns of injury were observed for each age group and gender. Males were more likely to be injured in the central years of life while females presented a trimodal pattern in the age distribution. Young adults (14-39 years old) were overall at higher risk of self-harm. Overall mortality was equal to 5.2%. Most deceased were male and ≥ 65 years of age.

Air transportation over-utilization in pediatric trauma patients

BACKGROUND

Air transportation can be a life-saving transfer modality for trauma patients. However, it is also costly and carries risk for air-crews and patients. We sought to examine the incidence of air transportation among pediatric trauma patients as well as the rate of over-triage in utilizing this intervention.

METHODS

We conducted a single-institution retrospective review of all pediatric trauma patients who utilized air transportation, either from scene to hospital or hospital to hospital Emergency Department (ED) transfers, between 2013 and 2018.

RESULTS

There were 348 pediatric trauma patients who utilized air transport. More than half of all patients (n = 186, 55.9%) were discharged from the hospital within 48 h, 121 (36.3%) were discharged within 24 h, and 34 (10.2%) were discharged home from the ED. The mean ISS was 11.2 ± 0.5 while only 31% had an ISS ≥15. There were 97 patients (27.9%) with elevated age adjusted shock index, and 101 patients (29.0%) who required time sensitive interventions. More than half of patients (59.3%) were initially taken to an outside hospital (OSH) and were then transferred to our facility by air while 40.4% were transported directly from scene to our institution by air. Patients who were transferred from an OSH were younger (6.8 ± 0.4 vs 11.2 ± 0.4, p < 0.01) and had a higher incidence of an elevated age-adjusted shock index (32.4% vs 19.1%, p = 0.006) as well as mortality (6.3% vs 1.4%, p = 0.03). However, ultimately there were no differences in ISS, rates of operative intervention, PICU utilization, or time sensitive intervention. Both groups had similarly high rates of discharge within 48 h, 24 h, and from the ED.

CONCLUSIONS

Air transportation among pediatric trauma patients from scene to hospital and hospital to hospital is over-utilized based on multiple metrics including low rates of ISS ≥15, elevated age-adjusted shock indexes, low rates of time sensitive intervention, as well as high rates of discharge within 24 and 48 h.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE

III TYPE OF STUDY: Clinical Research-retrospective review.

An Evaluation of Pediatric Secondary Overtriage in the Pennsylvania Trauma System

BACKGROUND

We sought to determine the secondary overtriage rate of pediatric trauma patients admitted to pediatric trauma centers. We hypothesized that pediatric secondary overtriage (POT) would constitute a large percentage of admissions to PTC.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The Pennsylvania Trauma Outcome Study database was retrospectively queried from 2003 to 2017 for pediatric (age ≤ 18 y) trauma patients transferred to accredited pediatric trauma centers in Pennsylvania (n = 6). Patients were stratified based on discharge within (early) and beyond (late) 24 h following admission. POT was defined as patients transferred to a PTC with an early discharge. Multilevel mixed-effects logistic regression model controlling for demographic and injury severity covariates were utilized to determine the adjusted impact of injury patterns on early discharge.

RESULTS

A total of 37,653 patients met inclusion criteria. For transfers, POT compromised 18,752 (49.8%) patients. Compared to POT, non-POT were more severely injured (ISS: 10 versus 6;P < 0.001) and spent less time in the ED (Min: 181 versus 207;P < 0.001). In adjusted analysis, concussion, closed skull vault fractures, supracondylar humerus fractures, and consults to neurosurgery were associated with increased odds of POT. Overall, femur fracture, child abuse evaluation, and consults to plastic surgery, orthopedics, and ophthalmology were all associated with a decreased risk of being POT.

CONCLUSIONS

POT comprises 49.8% of PTC transfer admissions in Pennsylvania's trauma system. Improving community resources for management of pediatric concussion and mild TBI could result in decreased rates of POT to PTCs. Developing better inter-facility transfer guidelines and increased education of adult TC and nontrauma center hospitals is needed to decrease POT.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE

Epidemiologic study, level III.

ISS is not an appropriate tool to estimate overtriage

PURPOSE

The aim of this work is to study a cohort of patients of ISS < 15 admitted to a TC, and to determine the number of patients that ultimately benefited from the skills and resources specific of a level 1 trauma center.

METHODS

Retrospective study from a prospective cohort of patients admitted to TC (Beaujon Hospital, APHP) for suspected severe trauma from January 2011 to December 2017. The main outcome criterion was the use of surgery or interventional radiology within the first 24 h after admission of patients with ISS < 15. The secondary outcomes were stratified into severe (mortality, resuscitation care, length of stay in intensive care units) and non-severe criteria (mild head injury, hospital discharge or transfer within 24 h).

RESULTS

Of 3035 patients admitted during the study period, 1409 with an ISS < 15 were included, corresponding to a theoretical overtriage rate of 46.4%. Among these, 611 patients (43.4%) underwent emergency intervention within the first 24 h (586 surgical interventions, 19 direct transfers to the operating theater and 6 acts of interventional radiology), 238 (16.9%) of patients presented with severe and 531 (38%) with non-severe outcome criteria.

CONCLUSION

This work demonstrates that in a cohort of patients classified as ISS < 15 admitted to a TC, a considerable amount of TC-specific resources are required, and patients present with severe outcome criteria despite being classified as overtriaged. These results suggest that triage of trauma patients should be based on resource use and clinical outcome rather than anatomic criteria.

Avoiding Cribari gridlock 2: The standardized triage assessment tool outperforms the Cribari matrix method in 38 adult and pediatric trauma centers

OBJECTIVES

The Cribari Matrix Method (CMM) is the current standard to identify over/undertriage but requires manual trauma triage reviews to address its inadequacies. The Standardized Triage Assessment Tool (STAT) partially emulates triage review by combining CMM with the Need For Trauma Intervention, an indicator of major trauma. This study aimed to validate STAT in a multicenter sample.

METHODS

Thirty-eight adult and pediatric US trauma centers submitted data for 97,282 encounters. Mixed models estimated the effects of overtriage and undertriage versus appropriate triage on the odds of complication, odds of discharge to a continuing care facility, and differences in length of stay for both CMM and STAT. Significance was assessed at p <0.005.

RESULTS

Overtriage (53.49% vs. 30.79%) and undertriage (17.19% vs. 3.55%) rates were notably lower with STAT than with CMM. CMM and STAT had significant associations with all outcomes, with overtriages demonstrating lower injury burdens and undertriages showing higher injury burdens than appropriately triaged patients. STAT indicated significantly stronger associations with outcomes than CMM, except in odds of discharge to continuing care facility among patients who received a full trauma team activation where STAT and CMM were similar.

CONCLUSIONS

This multicenter study strongly indicates STAT safely and accurately flags fewer cases for triage reviews, thereby reducing the subjectivity introduced by manual triage determinations. This may enable better refinement of activation criteria and reduced workload.

The transfer of clinical prediction models for early trauma care had uncertain effects on mistriage

OBJECTIVES

This study aimed to assess how transfers of clinical prediction models for early trauma care between different care contexts within a single health system affected mistriage rates.

STUDY DESIGN AND SETTING

Patients aged 15 years or older, registered between 2011 and 2016 in the Swedish national trauma registry, SweTrau, were included. Three data set groups were created: high- and low-volume centers, metropolitan and nonmetropolitan centers, and multicenters and single centers. Clinical prediction models were developed using logistic regression in each data set group and transferred between data sets within groups. Model performance was evaluated using mistriage rate, undertriage rate, and overtriage rate. Multiple imputation using chained equations was used to handle missing data. Model performance was reported as medians with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).

RESULTS

A total of 26,965 patients were included. Changes in mistriage rates after transfer ranged from -0.25 (95% CI -0.21 to 0.04) to 0.29 (95% CI 0.13-0.39). Both overtriage and undertriage rates were affected.

CONCLUSIONS

Transferring clinical prediction models for early trauma care is associated with substantial uncertainty in regards to the effect on model performance. Depending on the care context, model transfer led to either increased or decreased mistriage. Overtriage was more affected by model transfer than undertriage.

Performance of pre-hospital evaluations in ruling out invasive chest stab wounds

BACKGROUND

Some guidelines advocate for managing patients with penetrating thoracic wounds in trauma centres with cardiothoracic surgery. This systematic approach is questionable. Only 15% of these patients require surgery. It is known that clinical examination fails to detect hemopneumothorax in penetrating trauma. However, no studies have evaluated the combined diagnostic performance of vital signs and the clinical evaluation of wounds. The clinical characteristics of wounds have not been investigated. We aimed to evaluate the ability of combinations of pre-hospital signs to rule out invasive chest stab trauma.

METHODS

This was a prospective observational study. All consecutive adult patients hospitalized in the perioperative acute care unit of a tertiary university hospital were included. Injury diagnoses were provided by exploratory surgery and imaging tests. Patients with a final diagnosis of invasive wounds (IWs) and patients with only superficial wounds were compared. Data regarding management and outcome were analysed.

RESULTS

A total of 153 patients were included. After imaging or surgery, 58 (38%) patients were diagnosed with only superficial wounds, and 95 (62%) were diagnosed with thoracic or abdominal IWs. The false-negative rate of pre-hospital evaluations in the diagnosis of IWs was 42% [31-51]IQR25-75. In stable patients, pre-hospital data could not rule out IWs, with a negative predictive value of 58% and a positive predictive value of 70%. Twenty-nine (19%) patients required early emergent cardiothoracic surgery. Among these patients, 8 (28%) had no evidence of IWs in the pre-hospital period. Among the 59 patients without pre-hospital signs of IWs, 19 (33%) underwent at least one emergent procedure.

CONCLUSIONS

The combination of pre-hospital vital signs, visual evaluation of wounds, and physical examination failed to rule out IWs in patients with chest stab wounds. This implies that caution is needed in triage decision-making.

Survey on worldwide trauma team activation requirement

Purpose

Trauma team activation (TTA) is thought to be essential for advanced and specialized care of very severely injured patients. However, non-specific TTA criteria may result in overtriage that consumes valuable resources or endanger patients in need of TTA secondary to undertriage. Consequently, criterion standard definitions to calculate the accuracy of the various TTA protocols are required for research and quality assurance purposes. Recently, several groups suggested a list of conditions when a trauma team is considered to be essential in the initial care in the emergency room. The objective of the survey was to post hoc identify trauma-related conditions that are thought to require a specialized trauma team that may be widely accepted, independent from the country’s income level.

Methods

A set of questions was developed, centered around the level of agreement with the proposed post hoc criteria to define adequate trauma team activation. The participants gave feedback before they answered the survey to improve the quality of the questions. The finalized survey was conducted using an online tool and a word form. The income per capita of a country was rated according to the World Bank Country and Lending groups.

Results

The return rate was 76% with a total of 37 countries participating. The agreement with the proposed criteria to define post hoc correct requirements for trauma team activation was more than 75% for 12 of the 20 criteria. The rate of disagreement was low and varied between zero and 13%. The level of agreement was independent from the country’s level of income.

Conclusions

The agreement on criteria to post hoc define correct requirements for trauma team activation appears high and it may be concluded that the proposed criteria could be useful for most countries, independent from their level of income. Nevertheless, more discussions on an international level appear to be warranted to achieve a full consensus to define a universal set of criteria that will allow for quality assessment of over- and undertriage of trauma team activation as well as for the validation of field triage criteria for the most severely injured patients worldwide.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (10.1007/s00068-020-01334-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Torso computed tomography in blunt trauma patients with normal vital signs can be avoided using non-invasive tests and close clinical evaluation

PURPOSE

To determine whether torso CT can be avoided in patients who experience high-energy blunt trauma but have normal vital signs.

METHODS

High-energy blunt trauma patients with normal vital signs were retrieved retrospectively from our registry. We reviewed 1317 patients (1027 men and 290 women) and 761 (57.8%) fulfilled the inclusion criteria. All patients were initially evaluated at the emergency room (ER), with a set of tests, part of a specific protocol. Patients with at least one altered exam at initial examination or after six-hour observation received a torso CECT. Sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, positive (PPV) and negative predictive values (NPV), and likelihood ratio (LH) of the protocol were evaluated.

RESULTS

Of 761 patients, 354 (46.5%) received torso CECT because of the positive ER test, with 330 being true positive and 24 being false positive. The remaining 407 patients were negative at ER tests and did not receive torso CECT, showing a significantly (P < 0.001) lower Injury Severity Score (ISS). The positive and negative LH of the protocol to detect torso injuries were respectively 16.5 and 0.01 (overall accuracy of 0.96).

CONCLUSIONS

Torso CT can be avoided without adverse clinical outcomes in patients who experience high-energy blunt trauma, are hemodynamically stable, and have normal initial laboratory and imaging tests.

Geriatric patients on antithrombotic therapy as a criterion for trauma team activation leads to over triage

BACKGROUND

Our institution amended its trauma activation criteria to require a Level II activation for patients ≥65 years old on antithrombotic medication presenting with suspected head trauma.

METHODS

Our institutional trauma registry was queried for geriatric patients on antithrombotic medication in the year before and after this criteria change. Demographics, presentation metrics, level of activation, and outcomes were compared between groups.

RESULTS

After policy change, a greater proportion of patients received a trauma activation (19.9 vs. 74.9%, P < 0.001) and a greater proportion of these patients were discharged directly home without injury (4.3 vs. 44%, P < 0.001). However, a smaller proportion of patients with a critical Emergency Department disposition or traumatic intracranial hemorrhage failed to receive a trauma activation (65.1 vs. 23.5%, P < 0.001; 70.7% vs. 27.3%, P < 0.001). There was no change in mortality (4.3 vs. 2.0%, P = 0.21).

CONCLUSIONS

Implementing new criteria increased overtriage, decreased undertriage, and had little effect on mortality.

Evaluating the ability of a trauma team activation tool to identify severe injury: a multicentre cohort study

Background

Sensitive decision making tools should assist prehospital personnel in the triage of injured patients, identifying those who require immediate lifesaving interventions and safely reducing unnecessary under- and overtriage. In 2014 a new trauma team activation (TTA) tool was implemented in Central Norway. The overall objective of this study was to evaluate the ability of the new TTA tool to identify severe injury.

Methods

This was a multi-center observational cohort study with retrospective data analysis. All patients received by trauma teams at seven hospitals in Central Norway between 01.01.2015 to 31.12.2015 were included. Severe injury was defined as Injury Severity Score (ISS) > 15. Overtriage was defined as the rate of patients with TTA and ISS < 15, whilst patients with TTA and ISS > 15 were defined as correctly triaged.

Results

A total of 1141 patients were identified, of which 998 were eligible for triage criteria analysis. Median age was 35 years (IQR 20–58) and the male proportion was 67%. Mechanism of injury was predominantly blunt trauma (96%) with transport related accidents (62%) followed by falls (22%) the most common. Overall, median injury severity score (ISS) was low and severely injured patients (ISS > 15) comprised 13% of the cohort. Utility of specific TTA criteria were: physiology 20%, anatomical injury 21%, mechanism of injury (MOI) 53% and special causes 6%. Overtriage among all patients was 87%, and for those with physiologic criteria 66%, anatomical injury 82%, mechanism of injury 97% and special causes criteria 92%, respectively.

Conclusions

Severe injury was infrequent and there was a substantial rate of overtriage. The ability of the TTA tool was relatively insensitive in identifying severe injury, but showed increased performance when utilizing physiologic and anatomical injury criteria. Many of the TTA mechanism of injury criteria might be considered for removal from the triage tool due to substantial rates of overtriage. This has relevance for the proposed development of national Norwegian TTA criteria.

Simple modification of trauma mechanism alarm criteria published for the TraumaNetwork DGU® may significantly improve overtriage - a cross sectional study

Background

No consensus exists in the literature on the use of uniform emergency room trauma team activation criteria (ERTTAC). Today excessive over- or undertriage rates continue to be a challenge for most trauma centres. Application of ERTTAC, published for use in the German TraumaNetwork DGU^®, at a Swiss trauma centre resulted in a high overtriage rate. The aim of the investigation was to analyse the ERTTAC in detail with the intention of possible improvement.

Methods

The investigation included consecutive adult (age > 15 years) trauma patients treated at the emergency department of a level II trauma centre from 01.01.2013–31.12.2015. All data were collected prospectively. To identify over- and undertriage, patients with an Injury Severity Score (ISS) > 15 were defined as requiring specific emergency room (ER) management. ANOVA, Student’s t-test and chi-square analysis were used for statistical analysis with mean values ± standard deviation.

Results

1378 adult injured (64% male) received ER trauma team treatment (mean age 48.3 ± 21.2 years; ISS 9.7 ± 9.6) during the observation period. Of those, 326 ER patients (23.7%) were diagnosed with an ISS > 15, which proved to be an overtriage of 76.3%. 80/406 trauma patients with an ISS > 15 were not referred to the ER, resulting in an actual undertriage rate of 19.7%, mainly because the criteria list was not observed. Effectively applying ERTTAC according to the protocol in all cases would have reduced undertriage to 2.0% (8/406). The most frequent trigger for trauma team activation was injury mechanism (65%). A simulation revealed that omitting the criterion ‘passenger of car or truck’ (n = 326) would have prevented overtriage in 257 cases, as such lowering overtriage rate to 62.4% and at the same time increasing undertriage by only 8 cases to 7.1%.

Conclusion

Application of ERTTAC as published for TraumaNetwork DGU^® resulted in a lower undertriage but higher overtriage rate than recommended by the American College of Surgeons. Omitting the criterion ‘passenger of car or truck’ markedly improved overtriage with only a minimal increase in undertriage.

Trial registration

NCT02165137; retrospectively registered 11. June 2014.

A simplified trauma triage system safely reduces overtriage and improves provider satisfaction: a prospective study

BACKGROUND

Standard triage systems result in high rates of overtriage to achieve acceptably low undertriage. We previously validated optimal triage variables and used these to implement a new simplified triage system (NEW) at our hospital.

METHODS

All trauma entries from May 2010 to Feb 2013 were prospectively reviewed. Calculation of the undertriage and overtriage rates was based on the need for any urgent or life-saving intervention.

RESULTS

We identified 704 trauma patients. Level 1 activations were reduced from 32% (OLD) to 19% in the NEW system (P < .05). Overtriage was reduced from 79% (OLD) to 44% in the NEW system (P < .01). The undertriage rate was 1.6% in the NEW system, compared with 1.2% in the OLD system (P = nonsignificant). Of all patients, 14% (63) required a life-saving intervention. There were no deaths among undertriaged patients.

CONCLUSION

The NEW simplified triage system significantly reduced the rate of overtriage, while safely maintaining a low undertriage rate.

How often are interfacility transfers of spine injury patients truly necessary?

BACKGROUND CONTEXT

Traumatic spine injuries are often transferred to regional tertiary trauma centers from outside hospitals (OSHs) and subsequently discharged from the trauma center's emergency department (ED) suggesting secondary overtriage of such injuries.

PURPOSE

The aim of the study was to investigate the definitive treatment and disposition of traumatic spine injuries transferred from OSH, particularly those without other trauma injuries or neurologic symptoms.

STUDY DESIGN

This was a retrospective study.

PATIENT SAMPLE

Adult patients presenting to a single Level 1 trauma center with spine injuries were included.

OUTCOME MEASURES

The outcome measures considered in the study were appropriateness of transfer, treatment, and cost.

METHODS

Four thousand five-hundred consecutive adult patients presenting to a single Level 1 trauma center with spine injuries (isolated or polytrauma) were reviewed. This consisted of 1,427 patients (32%) transferred from an OSH ED. All OSH, emergency medical services, and receiving institution (RI) patient records and imaging were reviewed.

RESULTS

Patients who were neurologically intact, nonpolytrauma, and without critical medical issues at the OSH (isolated intact spine transfers) comprised 29% of transfers. Helicopters transported 13% of these patients. The most frequent injuries were compression (26%), burst (17%), and transverse process (10%) fractures. Seventy-eight percent were discharged directly from the RI's ED. Similarly, 15% were not given any formal treatment, 13% had surgery, and 72% given orthosis treatment. The average cost for transportation and ED costs for those discharged from the RI ED were $1,863 and $12,895, respectively. Of the isolated intact spine transfers, 42% were considered to be inappropriate to warrant transfer. This was defined as those sent from an OSH with an orthopedic or neurosurgeon on staff and clearly stable injuries with minimal chance of progressing to instability. Isolated intact spine transfers whose OSH spine imaging was not considered unstable was 25% of transfers with a helicopter used to transport 14% of these patients. Eighty-seven percent were discharged from the ED, whereas only 3% went onto surgery.

CONCLUSIONS

This study is the first to investigate interfacility transfers with spine injuries and found high rate of secondary overtriage of neurologically intact patients with isolated spine injuries. Potential solutions include increasing spine coverage in community EDs, increasing direct communication between the OSH and the spine specialist at the tertiary center, and utilization of teleradiology.

Helicopter overtriage in pediatric trauma

BACKGROUND

Helicopter Emergency Medical Services (HEMS) have been designed to provide faster access to trauma center care in cases of life-threatening injury. However, the ideal recipient population is not fully characterized, and indications for helicopter transport in pediatric trauma vary dramatically by county, state, and region. Overtriage, or unnecessary utilization, can lead to additional patient risk and expense. In this study we perform a nationwide descriptive analysis of HEMS for pediatric trauma and assess the incidence of overtriage in this group.

METHODS

We reviewed records from the American College of Surgeons National Trauma Data Bank (2008-11) and included patients less than 16 years of age who were transferred from the scene of injury to a trauma center via HEMS. Overtriage was defined as patients meeting all of the following criteria: Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) equal to 15, absence of hypotension, an Injury Severity Score (ISS) less than 9, no need for procedure or critical care, and a hospital length of stay of less than 24 hours.

RESULTS

A total of 19,725 patients were identified with a mean age of 10.5 years. The majority of injuries were blunt (95.6%) and resulted from motor vehicle crashes (48%) and falls (15%). HEMS transported patients were predominately normotensive (96%), had a GCS of 15 (67%), and presented with minor injuries (ISS<9, 41%). Overall, 28 % of patients stayed in the hospital for less than 24 hours, and the incidence of overtriage was 17%.

CONCLUSIONS

Helicopter overtriage is prevalent among pediatric trauma patients nationwide. The ideal model to predict need for HEMS must consider clinical outcomes in the context of judicious resource utilization. The development of guidelines for HEMS use in pediatric trauma could potentially limit unnecessary transfers while still identifying children who require trauma center care in a timely fashion.

Prehospital triage of trauma patients using the Random Forest computer algorithm

BACKGROUND

Overtriage not only wastes resources but also displaces the patient from their community and causes delay of treatment for the more seriously injured. This study aimed to validate the Random Forest computer model (RFM) as means of better triaging trauma patients to level 1 trauma centers.

METHODS

Adult trauma patients with "medium activation" presenting via helicopter to a level 1 trauma center from May 2007 to May 2009 were included. The "medium activation" trauma patient is alert and hemodynamically stable on scene but has either subnormal vital signs or accumulation of risk factors that may indicate a potentially serious injury. Variables included in the RFM analysis were demographics, mechanism of injury, prehospital fluid, medications, vitals, and disposition. Statistical analysis was performed via the Random Forest algorithm to compare our institutional triage rate to rates determined by the RFM.

RESULTS

A total of 1653 patients were included in this study, of which 496 were used in the testing set of the RFM. In our testing set, 33.8% of patients brought to our level 1 trauma center could have been managed at a level 3 trauma center, and 88% of patients who required a level 1 trauma center were identified correctly. In the testing set, there was an overtriage rate of 66%, whereas using the RFM, we decreased the overtriage rate to 42% (P < 0.001). There was an undertriage rate of 8.3%. The RFM predicted patient disposition with a sensitivity of 89%, specificity of 42%, negative predictive value of 92%, and positive predictive value of 34%.

CONCLUSIONS

Although prospective validation is required, it appears that computer modeling potentially could be used to guide triage decisions, allowing both more accurate triage and more efficient use of the trauma system.

Does scene physiology predict helicopter transport trauma admission?

BACKGROUND

Helicopter transport (HT) is necessary in the management of civilian trauma; however, its significant expense underscores the need to minimize overuse and inefficiency. Our objective was to determine whether on-scene physiologic criteria predict appropriate triage in HT trauma patients.

METHODS

We performed a retrospective review of patients flown from the injury scene to the emergency department of a level 1 trauma center by a university HT service from January 2006 to December 2010. Demographics, mechanism of injury, scene revised trauma score (RTS), travel distance, trauma alert level, payer status, emergency department and hospital disposition, and injury severity scores were queried from the electronic medical record and Trauma Registry of the American College of Surgeons with similar data on patients admitted because of trauma by ground transport for comparison. Proper triage criteria were defined through by the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma.

RESULTS

We identified 2522 HT patients. Of these, 1491 (59%) were properly triaged and 1031 (41%) were overtriaged. Univariate analysis revealed that the mean scene RTS was significantly higher for over- versus proper triage (7.68 ± 0.67 and 6.97 ± 1.57 respectively, P < 0.001). Neither the scene RTS nor travel distance predicted the triage criteria in a regression model (odds ratio 0.37, 95% confidence interval 0.16-0.85, and odds ratio 0.67, 95% confidence interval 0.60-0.74, respectively). Compared with ground transport, admitted HT patients had significantly more blunt trauma, lower scene RTSs, higher injury severity scores, more intensive care unit and ventilator days, a longer length of stay, and a greater travel distance and were more likely to be intubated (P < 0.001).

CONCLUSIONS

The physiological criteria did not predict the triage status in HT trauma patients. Although >40% of HT patients were overtriaged, they were more severely injured and required greater institutional resources than did the ground transport patients. Overtriage by a helicopter transport program might be appropriate.

A Retrospective Study of Five Clinical Criteria and One Age Criterion for Selective Prehospital Spinal Immobilization

Full spinal immobilization of blunt trauma victims is a widely accepted prehospital measure, applied in order to prevent (further) damage to the spinal cord. However, looking at the marginal evidence that exists for the effectiveness of spinal immobilization, and the growing evidence for the negative effects following immobilization, a more selective protocol might be able to reduce possible morbidity and mortality as good as the present prehospital immobilization protocol. In a retrospective study, the sensitivity of a selective prehospital immobilization protocol that adds an age criterion to five clinical spine clearance criteria is examined.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Based on ICD-9 codes, all patients admitted to the trauma center diagnosed with spinal fractures with or without spinal damage were identified. The sensitivity of the combination of five clinical criteria (reduced awareness, evidence of intoxication, neurological deficit, pain of the spine on palpation, (significant) distracting injury) and an age criterion (65 years or older at time of accident) was determined. If one or more criteria were positive, standard full immobilization would be indicated. The other patients would not have been immobilized.

RESULTS

A total of 238 blunt trauma victims primarily admitted to the trauma center were included for this study. Median age of the included patients was 39 years (range 5-98), with 32.8% female. A total of 236 had at least one positive criterion (sensitivity 99.2%). The two missed patients were male, 40 and 41 years old. Radiology showed a small fissure in the arch of C2, and a transverse process fracture of L3, respectively. Both patients were discharged the next day without complications or medical interventions.

CONCLUSION

In this retrospective study, a selective protocol based on clinical criteria instead of trauma mechanism showed 99.2% sensitivity for spinal fractures with or without spinal cord damage. Based on this study and the current controversy surrounding spinal immobilization, a prospective study should be considered to evaluate the five clinical criteria and one age criterion in the prehospital setting.