Abstract
BackgroundSelection of incidents and accurate identification of patients that require assistance from physician-staffed emergency medical services (P-EMS) remain essential. We aimed to evaluate P-EMS availability, the underlying criteria for dispatch, and the corresponding dispatch accuracy of trauma care in south-east Norway in 2015, to identify areas for improvement.MethodsPre-hospital data from emergency medical coordination centres and P-EMS medical databases were linked with data from the Norwegian Trauma Registry (NTR). Based on a set of conditions (injury severity, interventions performed, level of consciousness, incident category), trauma incidents were defined as complex, warranting P-EMS assistance, or non-complex. Incident complexity and P-EMS involvement were the main determinants when assessing the triage accuracy. Undertriage was adjusted for P-EMS availability and response and transport times.ResultsAmong 19,028 trauma incidents, P-EMS were involved in 2506 (13.2%). The range of overtriage was 74–80% and the range of undertriage was 20–32%. P-EMS readiness in the event of complex incidents ranged from 58 to 70%. The most frequent dispatch criterion was “Police/fire brigade request immediate response” recorded in 4321 (22.7%) of the incidents. Criteria from the groups “Accidents” and “Road traffic accidents” were recorded in 10,875 (57.2%) incidents, and criteria from the groups “Transport reservations” and “Unidentified problem” in 6025 (31,7%) incidents. Among 4916 patient pathways in the NTR, 681 (13.9%) could not be matched with pre-hospital data records.ConclusionsBoth P-EMS availability and dispatch accuracy remain suboptimal in trauma care in south-east Norway. Dispatch criteria are too vague to facilitate accurate P-EMS dispatch, and pre-hospital data is inconsistent and insufficient to provide basic data for scientific research. Future dispatch criteria should focus on the care aspect of P-EMS. Better tools for both dispatch and incident handling for the emergency medical coordination centres are essential. In general, coordination, standardisation, and integration of existing data systems should enhance the quality of trauma care and increase patient safety.
Highlights
Selection of incidents and accurate identification of patients that require assistance from physicianstaffed emergency medical services (P-Emergency medical services (EMS)) remain essential
Among the incidents categorised as undertriage, no physicianstaffed emergency medical services (P-EMS) were time saving in 338 incidents
We found that the undertriage of P-EMS dispatch in south-east Norway ranged between 20 and 32% when adjusted for availability and response and/or transport times
Summary
Selection of incidents and accurate identification of patients that require assistance from physicianstaffed emergency medical services (P-EMS) remain essential. Advanced trauma care consists of a series of complex interventions involving heterogeneous populations and conditions, over various time intervals, by different providers with varying skill set, and in different organisational settings. Because of this complexity, trauma research is intricate and literature on the subject is characterised by numerous studies with large heterogeneity as well as varying quality of evidence [2, 11,12,13,14]
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