Implementation of prehospital dispatch protocols that triage low-acuity patients to advice-line nurses.

Introduction: Although EMS agencies have been designed to efficiently provide medical assistance to individuals, the overuse of 9-1-1 as an alternative to primary medical care has resulted in the need for new methods to respond to this increasing demand. Our study analyzes the efficacy of classifying specific low-acuity calls that can be transferred to an advice-line nurse for further medical instruction. The objectives of our study were to analyze the impact of implementing this protocol and resultant patient feedback regarding the transfer to an advice-line nurse.

Utilization of prehospital dispatch protocols to identify low-acuity patients.

Objectives: To describe the experience of a U.S. emergency medical services (EMS) agency utilizing a dispatch algorithm to identify low-acuity patients and determine whether secondary telephone triage by a nurse was associated with subsequent hospital admission among those patients.

Association between patient unconscious or not alert conditions and cardiac arrest or high-acuity outcomes within the Medical Priority Dispatch System "Falls" protocol.

Introduction: Falls are one of the most common types of complaints received by 9-1-1 emergency medical dispatch centers. They can be accidental or may be caused by underlying medical problems. Though "not alert" falls patients with severe outcomes mostly are "hot" transported to the hospital, some of these cases may be due to other acute medical events (cardiac, respiratory, circulatory, or neurological), which may not always be apparent to the emergency medical dispatcher (EMD) during call processing.