How does a paramedic decide who to help first when there is more than one injured person?

Answer 1

Triage is the method of deciding who gets treatment first, and it's quite complex. In order, one treats: # Those who have a good chance of living but only if they receive treatment (red tag). Evac first. # Those who have less grave injuries. Under normal circumstances these foks would require an evac but are currently stable. Keep and eye on them and re-triage as necessary. Yellow Tag # Walking wounded. Shocks, minor injuries, fundamentally stable. Green tag -- evac after Yellow # Deceased, or likely to die even with treatment, or those whose treatment will be so extensive as to stop the majority of the overall rescue effort. Evac last. Black tag. Triage is difficult in every way. It requires an accurate, dispassionate assessment, and sometimes making the call about who dies and who doesn't. In tougher cases, one always hopes not to confront, the equation can bet very difficult. If you have 3 medics treating one man, and using up all the supplies, when his life expectancy is 30%, and 3 other less acute patients who have an 80% chance if treated, assuming they leave the more acute patient alone, you're going to have to make a very hard decision. Battlefield triage differs from this approach, but is beyond the scope of this anwer.