[Triage and white codes].
OBJECTIVE
In this paper, the authors analyse the type of accesses to the Emergency Department of the DEA of the G. Gaslini Institute defined by the triage as White Code, monitoring the outcome of said access.


METHODS
This investigation was of retrospective type and lasted 6 months. It employed the fast track triage nursing system for the selection of patients. Independently of their age and sex and presenting pathology, the selected patients, at the moment of nursing triage, received the white code on the basis of EPM (emergency paediatric medicine) paediatric triage guidelines. A specially designed grid containing motivations was applied to those admitted to hospital on the basis of the Emergency Department judgement. The prospective investigation was facilitated by the computerised emergency department patient management system that has been operative in our department since June 2000.


RESULTS
A total of 22400 white code accesses were recruited into the study; the admission percentage was 3.7% (89 patients). The most frequent reason for hospitalisation was the need to clinically classify a pathology that persisted without a complete response.


CONCLUSIONS
This preliminary investigation will be pursued in the future with a collection of data for organisation type purposes and in order to contribute to greater hospital-local district integration.
Palmieri
A
A
Pronto Soccorso Medico e Unità Operativ di Medicina d'Urgenza DEA Pediatrico, Istituto Giannina Gaslini, Genova, Italy.
Piccotti
E
E
Di Pietro
P
P
D002648:Child; D006801:Humans; D014218:Triage / Q000145:classification*