#Trauma center levels explained emt manual#

In 1976, the American College of Surgeons (ACS) released a manual titled Optimal Hospital Resources for the Injured Patient, a set of instructions that set the standard for hospital operation (American College of Surgeons, n.d.). This caused difficulties in ensuring that injured patients were administered the proper care. Prior to the 1970s, a decade that saw such breakthroughs in injury prevention as the bicycle helmet, there was no official means of categorizing a trauma center based on its capabilities. The purpose of a Level I trauma center is to provide what most hospitals and low-level centers cannot: total care and comprehensive treatment of patients with all forms of injury and at all stages of recovery Some of these low-level facilities have minimal critical care capabilities, but they cannot provide immediate specialist treatment or adequate, long-term care (American Trauma Society, n.d.). They are meant to treat relatively minor injuries and serve primarily as short-term immediate care facilities that can evaluate and stabilize patients, and, if necessary, prepare them for transport to higher-level trauma centers. In contrast, trauma centers that are classified as Level V only have the most basic emergency medical resources at their disposal. Level I trauma centers are extremely well-equipped, well-funded, and well-staffed. Trauma center designations range from Level V, the lowest, up to Level I. The level designation of a trauma center sets it apart from other, similar facilities and indicates the extent to which it is prepared to treat various types and degrees of trauma, as well as the volume of patients it is prepared to treat. The primary objective of all trauma centers is to provide treatment of injury in order to minimize the injury’s impact on the patient’s life, however not all trauma centers are designed, equipped, or staffed to treat the same injuries (American Trauma Society, n.d.). This rating indicates that the facility is able to provide the highest quality of care to a large number of patients and provide that care from the time of admission through to rehabilitation. The very worst of those cases, those involving grievous, life-threatening injuries or complicated damage requiring uncommon expertise and advanced equipment to treat, must be taken by the medical professionals who work in the specialized trauma centers that receive the highest rating possible: Level I. Each one of those 57,000 trauma center admissions represents a bone broken by a fall, an organ contusion sustained in a vehicle accident, or any of the other, virtually infinite, possible injuries a person can experience. Department of Health and Human Services, 2015, p. 57,000 (2015) of those 130,000 visits, more than 40%, resulted in admission to verified trauma centers (U.S. According to the U.S Department of Health and Human Services’ National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (2015), there were over 130,000 visits to American emergency departments in 2015. Every year, thousands of people require emergency medical treatment following severe injury. Unintentional traumatic injury is the third leading cause of death in the United States behind cancer and heart disease (Murphy, Xu, Kochanek, Arias, 2018), and the leading cause of death for people under 44 (Faul et al., 2014, p. In this foreword to observation articles by Barnette, Burri, Chandler, Joyner, Luterman, Piekarski, and Zheng, James Carlson goes through the history and characteristics of Level I Trauma Centers, which provide the highest quality care possible and take in the most injured patients.

Trauma center levels explained emt