European journal of emergency medicine : official journal of the European Society for Emergency Medicine
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Triage and redirection of patients to alternative care providers is one tool used to overcome the growing issue of crowding in emergency departments (EDs). Electronic patient self-triage (eTriage) may reduce waiting times and required face-to-face contact. There are limited studies into its efficacy, accuracy and validity in an ED setting. ⋯ Agreement and correlation of eTriage with the reference standard of nurse MTS was low; patients using eTriage tended to over triage when compared to the triage nurse. eTriage had a higher sensitivity for high acuity presentations and demonstrated similar specificity for low acuity presentations when compared to triage nurse MTS. Further work is necessary to validate eTriage as a potential tool for safe redirection of ED attenders to alternative care providers.
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Multicenter Study Observational Study
The association between presenting complaints and clinical outcomes in emergency department patients of different age categories.
Although aging societies in Western Europe use presenting complaints (PCs) in emergency departments (EDs) triage systems to determine the urgency and severity of the care demand, it is unclear whether their prognostic value is age-dependent. ⋯ Frequency of PCs in ED patients varies with age, but the same PCs occur in all age categories. For most PCs, (case-mix adjusted) hospitalization and mortality vary across age categories. 'Chest pain' and 'palpitations,' usually triaged 'very urgent', carry a low risk for hospitalization and mortality.