@article {Budd302, author = {Henry Robert Budd and Lawrence Maximilian Almond and Keith Porter}, title = {A survey of trauma alert criteria and handover practice in England and Wales}, volume = {24}, number = {4}, pages = {302--304}, year = {2007}, doi = {10.1136/emj.2006.038323}, publisher = {British Association for Accident and Emergency Medicine}, abstract = {Introduction: Appropriate alerting of patients with trauma and informative handover are necessary to allow a smooth transition of care between the prehospital and hospital teams. Aim: To identify current practice and areas that need to be improved to facilitate the transition from prehospital care to emergency department resuscitation. Methods: A questionnaire postal study of 100 emergency departments and all 32 ambulance service trusts in England and Wales. Results: Emergency departments returned 34 (34\%) completed questionnaires, and ambulance trusts returned 16 (50\%) completed questionnaires. In all, 56.8\% of emergency department responders stated that trauma alert information was relayed through ambulance control, 48.5\% stated that alert messages were standardised and 18.5\% felt that ambulance crews used the trauma severity scoring system during alerting. 64.7\% stated that handover was broadcast to the trauma team and 9.1\% routinely received digital photographic images. All ambulance service responders included injury mechanism in their alerting criteria and 53.3\% used a standard handover structure with 86.7\% familiar with the mnemonic ASHICE (Age, Sex, History, Injuries, Condition, Expected time of arrival) for rapid information transmission. Discussion: Greater cooperation between regional emergency departments and ambulance services is necessary to refine the alerting and handover process, producing a pathway through which vital information is collected by trained personnel and communicated without distortion to the resuscitation room, where it may be utilised to inform life-saving decisions.}, issn = {1472-0205}, URL = {https://emj.bmj.com/content/24/4/302}, eprint = {https://emj.bmj.com/content/24/4/302.full.pdf}, journal = {Emergency Medicine Journal} }