Impact of a Triage Liaison Physician

Impact of a Triage Liaison Physician on the Time to First Medical Evaluation in the Emergency Departement

Due to an increasing number of patients admitted in emergency departments, many patients cannot be evaluated immediately after their admission. The function of "triage liaison physician" was introduced in Spring 2015. The objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of this new function on patients' flow in the ED.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Emergencies; Triage
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Triage liaison physician

Detailed Description

Geneva University Hospitals (GUH) emergency department (ED) admits more than 64000 patients every year. These patients are triaged using the Swiss Emergency Triage Scale (SETS), a 4-level triage scale. The SETS imposes time objectives until the first medical evaluation (20 minutes for SETS 2, 2 hours for SETS 3). In 2014, only 60% of level-2 and 63% of level-3 emergencies were evaluated within 20 and 120 minutes respectively.

A triage liaison physician was introduced in Spring 2015 with the mission to help triage nurse in their decisions and to evaluate quickly the patients that cannot be immediately installed in an ED evaluation room.

The objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of the triage liaison physician on the times to first medical evaluation.

• Study Type: Observational
• Enrollment (Actual): 69893

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Switzerland
  • Geneva, Switzerland, 1211
    • Geneva University Hospitals, ED

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 16 years and older (ADULT, OLDER_ADULT, CHILD)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

• Sampling Method: Non-Probability Sample

Study Population

All patient admitted in GUH ED during 2 years.

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• >= 16 y
• admitted in GUH ED

Exclusion Criteria:

• patients triaged to outpatient clinics

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Number of groups / cohorts

2

Cohorts and Interventions

Group / Cohort	Intervention / Treatment
Before triage liaison physician; All patients admitted before the introduction of the function of triage liaison physician.
After triage liaison physician; All patients admitted after the introduction of the function of triage liaison physician.	Other: Triage liaison physician; A triage liaison physician is present from 7:30 am to 10:30 pm, Monday to Friday, with the mission to evaluate quickly patients who cannot be immediately installed in an ED room

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Proportion of patients evaluated within SETS objectives	Proportion of patients evaluated within time objective as defined by SETS standards.	Within 120 minutes after ED triage

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Time to first medical contact	Time elapsed between triage and first medical evaluation	Within 24 hours after ED triage

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University Hospital, Geneva

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: November 1, 2016
• Primary Completion (ACTUAL): June 1, 2017
• Study Completion (ACTUAL): June 1, 2017

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: November 24, 2016
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: December 1, 2016
• First Posted (ESTIMATE): December 2, 2016

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (ACTUAL): July 27, 2017
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 26, 2017
• Last Verified: July 1, 2017

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Pathologic Processes; Disease Attributes; Emergencies
• Other Study ID Numbers: CCER 2016-00179

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO