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Technology for trauma: testing the validity of a smartphone app for pre-hospital clinicians

Technology for trauma: testing the validity of a smartphone app for pre-hospital clinicians
Technology for trauma: testing the validity of a smartphone app for pre-hospital clinicians
Introduction: with the introduction of regional trauma networks in England, ambulance clinicians have been required to make triage decisions relating to severity of injury, and appropriate destination for the patient, which may require ‘bypassing’ the nearest Emergency Department. A ‘Trauma Unit Bypass Tool’ is utilised in this process. The Major Trauma Triage tool smartphone application (App) is a digital representation of a tool, available for clinicians to use on their smartphone. Prior to disseminating the application, validity and performance against the existing paper-based tool was explored.

Methods: a case-based study using clinical scenarios was conducted. Scenarios, with appropriate triage decisions, were agreed by an expert panel. Ambulance clinicians were assigned to either the paper-based tool or smartphone app group and asked to make a triage decision using the available information. The positive predictive value (PPV) of each tool was calculated.

Results: the PPV of the paper tool was 0.76 and 0.86 for the smartphone app. User comments were mainly positive for both tools with no negative comments relating to the smartphone app.

Conclusion: the smartphone app version of the Trauma Unit Bypass Tool performs at least as well as the paper version and can be utilised safely by pre-hospital clinicians in supporting triage decisions relating to potential major trauma
pre-hospital emergency care, emergency medical services, paramedics, emergency medicine, trauma
1755-599X
1-6
Freshwater, Eleanor S
76d936bf-6b6b-487f-9757-10bc6df0ad0d
Crouch, Robert
7f98a42e-ee34-4520-ab33-83cd3acf05b7
Freshwater, Eleanor S
76d936bf-6b6b-487f-9757-10bc6df0ad0d
Crouch, Robert
7f98a42e-ee34-4520-ab33-83cd3acf05b7

Freshwater, Eleanor S and Crouch, Robert (2015) Technology for trauma: testing the validity of a smartphone app for pre-hospital clinicians. International Emergency Nursing, 23 (1), 1-6, [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ienj.2014.04.003]. (doi:10.1016/j.ienj.2014.04.003).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Introduction: with the introduction of regional trauma networks in England, ambulance clinicians have been required to make triage decisions relating to severity of injury, and appropriate destination for the patient, which may require ‘bypassing’ the nearest Emergency Department. A ‘Trauma Unit Bypass Tool’ is utilised in this process. The Major Trauma Triage tool smartphone application (App) is a digital representation of a tool, available for clinicians to use on their smartphone. Prior to disseminating the application, validity and performance against the existing paper-based tool was explored.

Methods: a case-based study using clinical scenarios was conducted. Scenarios, with appropriate triage decisions, were agreed by an expert panel. Ambulance clinicians were assigned to either the paper-based tool or smartphone app group and asked to make a triage decision using the available information. The positive predictive value (PPV) of each tool was calculated.

Results: the PPV of the paper tool was 0.76 and 0.86 for the smartphone app. User comments were mainly positive for both tools with no negative comments relating to the smartphone app.

Conclusion: the smartphone app version of the Trauma Unit Bypass Tool performs at least as well as the paper version and can be utilised safely by pre-hospital clinicians in supporting triage decisions relating to potential major trauma

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More information

Accepted/In Press date: January 2015
Published date: January 2015
Keywords: pre-hospital emergency care, emergency medical services, paramedics, emergency medicine, trauma
Organisations: Faculty of Health Sciences

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 366234
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/366234
ISSN: 1755-599X
PURE UUID: 4f67ef0c-7453-4692-9968-24aa27dd1231

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Date deposited: 26 Jun 2014 13:02
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 17:05

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Contributors

Author: Eleanor S Freshwater
Author: Robert Crouch

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