How Australasian Triage Scale helps Determine urgency of medical interventions

Question

Task: Provide a brief note on the Australian Triage Scale

Answer

Introduction
In the area of Emergency Departments, triage is considered to be a very significant tool especially in circumstances like the occurrence of numerous patients at the same time. It is a medical instrument to analyze the highest waiting time needed to carry out the clinical valuation and medication for the patients. When a patient is being admitted to the Emergency Department the tool of Australasian triage scale is used to determine the degree of urgency for medical interventions. By exercising this tool, the medical attenders in the emergency department could make the maximum utilization of the limited reserve provided. Hence the patients could be attended according to the complication and seriousness of the conditions. It is also very important to allocate the concerned patients to respective medical treatment departments for better and effective therapy. The use of the Australasian triage scale is extremely important and any sort of medical intervention or initiatives could not reduce its significance (Australian College for Emergency Medicine, 2018). This tool was invented in the early decades of the 1980s because of the increases circumstances of critical cases in the Emergency departments. This tool would be very efficient at making efficient judgmental decisions in a battlefield like situation and thus would be very conclusive in saving lives. Although there are very clear guidelines given in the Australasian triage scale, many conceptions about its implementation prevail among the medical officials (Chamberlain et al., 2015). An awareness should be created among the people that the provision of Australasian triage scale is was made for the convenience of them rather than pushing them away from hospitals and other medical clinics. Since this tool helps to determine the preference for medical intervention, it bears a lot of significance. If elaborated on the context of triage exercised in Australia, the system national triage i.e. the National Triage Scale was implied in the year 1993, the provisions of which were amended in the year 2000. Thereafter it was termed as Australasian Trial Scale.

As per the guidelines provided in the Australiasian triage scale, the urgency and the time to react accordingly is given below

As per the details provided in the table given above, the term ATS 1 represents a very critical and dangerous condition of the patient which requires immediate attention and medical interventions from the staff. This condition is considered to be a very serious one and most of the staff present in the emergency department are expected to handle this condition. If considered the case of ATS 5, the condition f the patient would be a much minor one and could be cured and cleared in the time of 2 hours. The employees appointed in the emergency department should comprise of well experienced and certified nurses who are trained to handle Emergency Triage Education Kit efficiently. As mentioned earlier the valuation of the degree of seriousness and cruciality could be done by testing the physical appearance, medical history and the psychological condition of the patient. The major factor like extreme pain or other sorts of distress could be very decisive in determining the urgency and thus the degree of ATS should be applied to it. Roughly saying the ATS level should be directly proportional to the sufferings and pain of the patient.

While implementing the tool of triage, it should be noted by the officials in the emergency department that the valuation of the condition should not take more than 5 minutes though it should be done very cautiously without making any hurry. Hence a balanced level of speed and accuracy is needed in the implementation of the triage scale. While implementing this tool, the psychological condition and the physical condition should be scrutinized and present issues of the patient should be noted down. Non-urgent symptoms should only be checked if the condition and time allows to do it. If any of the patient’s condition is observed to be lying under the classification of ATS Category 1 or ATS Category 2, he should be placed on the top of the preference list and provided with immediate medication and care. In the process of triage, no specific diagnosis is conducted. If considered the triage process conducted in the health institutes of Australia, the procedure is conducted by the officials having immense experience and knowledge (Australian College for Emergency Medicine, 2018). In the critical stage, the valuation of the patient's condition should be conducted at the frequency of 10 minutes until the patient covers the dangerous situation. Many studies and experiments have been conducted by the learned researchers to ascertain the practical efficiency of the Australasian triage cycle in alleviating the serious condition of the patient. As per the observations of Ebrahim et al., (2015) made in their recent research paper conducted regarding the efficiency and dependability of the new Australasian triage scale after its implementation the recovery rate of the patients with the critical issue had increased. Rather than just using the Australian triage scale, the researchers also recommend to use the tool of Glasgow Coma Scale along with it, to make the staff focus and attend on the unidentified perspectives and consecutively responding to the hidden issues of the admitted patient. It had been observed that the combination of both had increased the efficiency of the staff in the emergency department and helped in understanding the reaction to the traumatic and painful condition he is going through. Although the Australasian Triage Cycle still needs to be studied and upgraded since the ATS level 3 and ATS level 4 are very similar in practicality and there are no strict guidelines regarding the classification of it. It should be noted that only the people with minor injuries and bruises should be classified under the classification of ATS 5 since they come last at the preference list of the staff in the emergency department and no patient with serious issues should have to wait longer (Hodge et al., 2013).

Matt’s Category
As per the case study given in this task, the section where Matt should be categorized would be ATS 1 of the Australasian triage scale since is heavily injured. Matt is suffering through very critical injury in his legs and head because of the accident he came across while riding the quad bike. It had been confirmed by the staff in the emergency department after observing his X-ray reports that there is a complex fracture in the fibula and the right proximal trivia. The handover of Matt was done to the emergency department as soon as he was admitted to the hospital. The staff of the neurological department had responded quickly to the newly admitted Matt and in the diagnosis, he had attained a score of 15 that signified that he needed urgent medical aid to recover from this condition (Hodge et al., 2013). Since the patient is losing blood at a very high rate, the staff in the emergency department had started taking necessary steps to pacify the condition in a matter of time. All the departments like paramedics had started working cordially and efficiently to bring the patient in a safe and sound condition (Chamberlain et al., 2015). The doctors had suggested conducting a surgery on Matt to treat the complex surgery and make the physiological condition a little better. Matt would be considered as an ATS 1 case since he had lost a lot of blood, undergone numerous rigorous traumas. Bringing him under the ATS 1 would attract a unified effort from all of the emergency department staffs and would require a fast intervention from all the officials. How Australasian Triage Scale assignments are being prepared by our management assignment help experts from top universities which let us to provide you a reliable assignment help online service.

References

Australian College for Emergency Medicine. (2018). ACEM - Triage. Acem.org.au. Retrieved 9 April 2018, from https://acem.org.au/Content-Sources/Advancing-Emergency-Medicine/Better-Outcomes-for-Patients/Triage.aspx

Chamberlain, D. J., Willis, E., Clark, R., & Brideson, G. (2015). Identification of the severe sepsis patient at triage: a prospective analysis of the Australasian Triage Scale. Emerg Med J, 32(9), 690-697.

Ebrahimi, M., Heydari, A., Mazlom, R., & Mirhaghi, A. (2015). The reliability of the Australasian Triage Scale: a meta-analysis. World journal of emergency medicine, 6(2), 94.

Hodge, A., Hugman, A., Varndell, W., & Howes, K. (2013). A review of the quality assurance processes for the Australasian Triage Scale (ATS) and implications for future practice. Australasian Emergency Nursing Journal, 16(1), 21-29