Triage
During wars and natural disasters, there are sometimes not enough doctors and equipment to treat everyone at once. Doctors must decide quickly whom to treat first. How do they make such decisions?
Dr. Kanto tells about making a painful decision to turn off a sick child’s oxygen. The nurse could not do it at all, and for Dr. Kanto, it was very stressful. However, Dr. Kanto was following the accepted medical practice of triage.
Triage is the process of determining whom to treat first. The term comes from the French verb trier meaning “to select.”
Triage was used first in World War I, when doctors had to treat large numbers of soldiers with limited supplies of medicine and equipment. They had to make quick decisions about whom to treat first.
Triage is used today when there are too many victims to be treated all at once. Victims are divided into four categories by using colored tags.
Category I (Red): Those who are likely to die if they are not treated immediately; they are treated first.
Category II (Yellow): Those who need hospital treatment but whose injuries are not life-threatening.
Category III (Green): Those with minor injuries.
Category 0 (Black): Those who are dead or so badly injured that they are unlikely to survive even if they are treated immediately.
Triage lets doctors save the greatest number of lives. But it places life-and-death decisions in the hands of individual doctors and nurses who are committed to saving the life of every patient. These decisions can be very stressful. There is also the issue of responsibility. Should individual doctors be held responsible if it later turns out that the decision was wrong?
Triage is an extreme measure that should rarely be used. Every individual life is important; all suffering should be treated. Society must prepare well in advance for possible disaster. If triage must be used, we should pay deep respect to those who make these hard decisions.
During wars and natural disasters, there are sometimes not enough doctors and equipment to treat everyone at once. Doctors must decide quickly whom to treat first. How do they make such decisions?
Dr. Kanto tells about making a painful decision to turn off a sick child’s oxygen. The nurse could not do it at all, and for Dr. Kanto, it was very stressful. However, Dr. Kanto was following the accepted medical practice of triage.
Triage is the process of determining whom to treat first. The term comes from the French verb trier meaning “to select.”
Triage was used first in World War I, when doctors had to treat large numbers of soldiers with limited supplies of medicine and equipment. They had to make quick decisions about whom to treat first.
Triage is used today when there are too many victims to be treated all at once. Victims are divided into four categories by using colored tags.
Category I (Red): Those who are likely to die if they are not treated immediately; they are treated first.
Category II (Yellow): Those who need hospital treatment but whose injuries are not life-threatening.
Category III (Green): Those with minor injuries.
Category 0 (Black): Those who are dead or so badly injured that they are unlikely to survive even if they are treated immediately.
Triage lets doctors save the greatest number of lives. But it places life-and-death decisions in the hands of individual doctors and nurses who are committed to saving the life of every patient. These decisions can be very stressful. There is also the issue of responsibility. Should individual doctors be held responsible if it later turns out that the decision was wrong?
Triage is an extreme measure that should rarely be used. Every individual life is important; all suffering should be treated. Society must prepare well in advance for possible disaster. If triage must be used, we should pay deep respect to those who make these hard decisions.