title: Triage and air evacuation strategy for mass casualty events: a model based on combat experience.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Management of combat casualties should optimize outcomes by appropriate patient triage, prehospital care, and rapid transport to the most capable medical facility, while avoiding overwhelming individual facilities.
  
  
  METHODS
  Planning the medical support for the campaign was done by the medical department of the IDF Southern command in cohort with the medical department of the Homefront command. Data collection and analysis were done by the Trauma Branch of the Medical corp.
  
  
  RESULTS
  339 soldiers were injured, among them were 10 fatalities. Five hospitals received casualties, although the 2 regional hospitals received 84% of the primary evacuation load. The majority of urgently injured soldiers (90%) were evacuated by air, as opposed to 59% of non-urgently injured soldiers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In a cross border setting, airlifting the urgent casualties to farther away level I trauma centers provides appropriate care for them, while not crossing the "surge capacity" line for the near-by medical centers.
authors.affiliation: Trauma Branch, Israel Defence Force, 02149.
authors.forename: Yuval
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ran
authors.forename: Eran
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Hadad
authors.forename: Saleh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Daher
authors.forename: Ori
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Ganor
authors.forename: Yana
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yegorov
authors.forename: Udi
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Katzenell
authors.forename: Nachman
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ash
authors.forename: Gil
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Hirschhorn
mesh_terms: D006761:Hospitals / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007557:Israel; D054527:Mass Casualty Incidents; D008889:Military Personnel; D014187:Transportation of Patients / Q000458:organization & administration*; D015599:Trauma Severity Indices; D014218:Triage / Q000458:organization & administration*; D014857:Warfare