• Kavita Varshney, James Mallows, and Mohind Hamd.
• Emergency Department, Westmead Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
• Emerg Med Australas. 2012 Apr 1;24(2):187-93.

ObjectiveTo determine which of the disaster triage tag systems in use in Australia and New Zealand is better in terms of the time taken to complete the triage and the ease of use.MethodsA disaster scenario was created. Mock patients were provided with clinical information to allow them to be triaged in a disaster sieve. Six different triage tag systems available in Australia and New Zealand were trialled. Participants triaged 10 patients with each triage tag system. The 10 patients used were different for each of the tag systems and were standardized for acuity and triage category. The time to complete the triage of the 10 patients with each different tag system was measured. The participants then completed a questionnaire with regards to the ease of use of the different tags and were asked to nominate their most preferred tag.ResultsThe Victorian cruciate fold up tag was the quickest to complete, with an average of 6.6 min to triage 10 patients, compared with an average time for all systems of 7.8 min. New Zealand tags were found to be the easiest to use, easiest to fill in and were considered the most preferred tag.ConclusionThe Victorian style of tag was found to be the most efficient in terms of the time to complete a triage. The New Zealand tags were the easiest to use, easiest to fill in and the most preferred tag by the participants. We recommend that one of these tags be adapted for use as a nationwide system.© 2012 The Authors. EMA © 2012 Australasian College for Emergency Medicine and Australasian Society for Emergency Medicine.

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