Urban Wisconsin pediatric patients using an after-hours telephone triage service: outcomes and compliance.

Objective: Evaluate the ability of a telephone triage service (TTS) to assess illness acuity of and patient compliance with advice given.

Design: Retrospective, observational study.

Patients: Patients of an urban, academic, pediatric clinic whose parents or caregivers called the TTS between July 23, 1997 and August 23, 1997.

Code teams and the review of cardiac arrests.

A new system for responding to Codes, or resuscitations of patients with cardiopulmonary arrest, was implemented at St Luke's Medical Center, Milwaukee. A teaching program was begun to establish the Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) guidelines as the standard of care. A task force defined the composition of the Code team and was then designated the Code Review Committee, meeting monthly to review all Codes.