In medicine, triage is a process by which care providers such as medical professionals and those with first aid knowledge determine the order of priority for providing treatment to injured individuals and/or inform the rationing of limited supplies so that they go to those who can most benefit from it. Triage is usually relied upon when there are more injured individuals than available care providers, or when there are more injured individuals than supplies to treat them.
Emergency medical services (EMS), also known as ambulance services or paramedic services, are emergency services that provide urgent pre-hospital treatment and stabilisation for serious illness and injuries and transport to definitive care. They may also be known as a first aid squad, FAST squad, emergency squad, ambulance squad, ambulance corps, life squad or by other initialisms such as EMAS or EMARS.
999 is an official emergency telephone number in a number of countries which allows the caller to contact emergency services for emergency assistance. Countries and territories using the number include Bahrain, Bangladesh, Botswana, Eswatini, Ghana, Guernsey, Hong Kong, the Republic of Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey, Kenya, Macau, Malaysia, Mauritius, Poland, Qatar, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Trinidad and Tobago, Seychelles, Uganda, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and Zimbabwe.
An emergency department (ED), also known as an accident and emergency department (A&E), emergency room (ER), emergency ward (EW) or casualty department, is a medical treatment facility specializing in emergency medicine, the acute care of patients who present without prior appointment; either by their own means or by that of an ambulance. The emergency department is usually found in a hospital or other primary care center.
The London Ambulance Service NHS Trust (LAS) is an NHS trust responsible for operating ambulances and answering and responding to urgent and emergency medical situations within the London region of England. The service responds to 999 phone calls across the region, and 111 phone calls from certain parts, providing triage and advice to enable an appropriate level of response.
The Scottish Ambulance Service is part of NHS Scotland, which serves all of Scotland's population. The Scottish Ambulance Service is governed by a special health board and is funded directly by the Health and Social Care Directorates of the Scottish Government.
The Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust is the national ambulance service for Wales. It was established on 1 April 1998 and as of December 2018 has 3,400 staff providing ambulance and related services to the 3 million residents of Wales.
Emergency service response codes are predefined systems used by emergency services to describe the priority and response assigned to calls for service. Response codes vary from country to country, jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and even agency to agency, with different methods used to categorize responses to reported events.
Hospital emergency codes are coded messages often announced over a public address system of a hospital to alert staff to various classes of on-site emergencies. The use of codes is intended to convey essential information quickly and with minimal misunderstanding to staff while preventing stress and panic among visitors to the hospital. Such codes are sometimes posted on placards throughout the hospital or are printed on employee identification badges for ready reference.
Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service (WFPS) provides fire and EMS services to the City of Winnipeg, Manitoba. It operates from 27 fire stations, and 3 administration offices across the city.
Emergency medical services in France are provided by a mix of organizations under public health control. The central organizations that provide these services are known as a SAMU, which stands for Service d’aide médicale urgente. Local SAMU organisations operate the control rooms that answer emergency calls and dispatch medical responders. They also operate the SMUR, which refers to the ambulances and response vehicles that provide advanced medical care. Other ambulances and response vehicles are provided by the fire services and private ambulance services.
Emergency medical services in the United Kingdom provide emergency care to people with acute illness or injury and are predominantly provided free at the point of use by the four National Health Services (NHS) of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Emergency care including ambulance and emergency department treatment is only free to UK residents and a charge may be made to those not entitled to free NHS care.
Grady EMS is an emergency care provider owned by Grady Healthcare System, established in 1892 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Emergency medical services in the Netherlands is a system of pre hospital care provided by the government in partnership with private companies.
Emergency medical services in Australia are provided by state ambulance services, which are a division of each state or territorial government, and by St John Ambulance in both Western Australia and the Northern Territory.
An emergency medical dispatcher is a professional telecommunicator, tasked with the gathering of information related to medical emergencies, the provision of assistance and instructions by voice, prior to the arrival of emergency medical services (EMS), and the dispatching and support of EMS resources responding to an emergency call. The term "emergency medical dispatcher" is also a certification level and a professional designation, certified through the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials-International (APCO) and the International Academies of Emergency Dispatch. Many dispatchers, whether certified or not, will dispatch using a standard emergency medical dispatch protocol.
A mass casualty incident describes an incident in which emergency medical services resources, such as personnel and equipment, are overwhelmed by the number and severity of casualties. For example, an incident where a two-person crew is responding to a motor vehicle collision with three severely injured people could be considered a mass casualty incident. The general public more commonly recognizes events such as building collapses, train and bus collisions, plane crashes, earthquakes and other large-scale emergencies as mass casualty incidents. Events such as the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, the September 11 attacks in 2001, and the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013 are well-publicized examples of mass casualty incidents. The most common types of MCIs are generally caused by terrorism, mass-transportation accidents, fires or natural disasters. A multiple casualty incident is one in which there are multiple casualties. The key difference from a mass casualty incident is that in a multiple casualty incident the resources available are sufficient to manage the needs of the victims. The issue of resource availability is therefore critical to the understanding of these concepts. One crosses over from a multiple to a mass casualty incident when resources are exceeded and the systems are overwhelmed.
Emergency Medical Dispatch (EMD) refers to a system that enhances services provided by Public Safety Answering Point (emergency) call takers, such as municipal emergency services dispatchers. It does so by allowing the call taker to quickly narrow down the caller's type of medical or trauma situation, so as to better dispatch emergency services, and provide quality instruction to the caller before help arrives.
111 is a free-to-call single non-emergency number medical helpline operating in England, Scotland and Wales. The 111 phone service has replaced the various non-geographic 0845 rate numbers and is part of each country's National Health Service: in England the service is known as NHS 111; in Scotland, NHS 24; and in Wales, NHS111 Wales.
NHS Pathways is a triage software utilised by the National Health Service of England to triage public telephone calls for medical care and emergency medical services – such as 999 or 111 calls – in some NHS trusts and five of the ambulance services in the country. In its emergency capacity, it has replaced the Advanced Medical Priority Dispatch System for some trusts, and in non-emergency telephone triage it is found in many medical care triage systems, such as NHS 111.
