Schmitt-Thompson Guidelines Ensure Appropriate After-Hour Dispositions
Nurse telephone triage organizations using Schmitt-Thompson After-Hours Nurse Triage Guidelines can correctly direct patients to the right level of care:
- providing quality and consistent patient care,
- guaranteed patient safety,
- establishing clinical efficiencies for clients and their patients,
- and providing 24/7 access to care.
The latest published Schmitt-Thompson After-Hours Nurse Triage guidelines indicate that organizations who use the Schmitt-Thompson clinical content continued to provide high-quality care to patients during the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in the following outcomes:
- High Home Care Outcomes – 50% of pediatric callers and 25% of adult callers
- High Physician Appointment Outcomes (4 Hours & 24 Hours) — 36% of pediatric callers and 39% of adult callers.
With more than 65% of calls resulting in non-emergent outcomes, these healthcare organizations decreased ED costs and supported improved ED utilization, saving room for patients needing immediate hands-on care during critical times.
See the graphs below, summarizing medical call center encounter data for the calendar year 2020 of organizations using Schmitt-Thompson After-Hours guidelines — segmented by pediatric and adult patient callers.
Schmitt-Thompson After-Hours Guideline Users: 2020 Disposition Rates
Schmitt-Thompson Guidelines Distinguished for Producing Appropriate Results
The Schmitt-Thompson guidelines have been featured in several research studies in peer-reviewed journals, which highlight positive results, including:
- High caller compliance with recommendations for ED referral and Home Care dispositions
- High caller satisfaction of over 95%
- High efficacy with 90% appropriate ED referral rates
- High PCP satisfaction
- Substantial cost-savings in a recent study of caller prior intent (70% of ED self-referrals were unnecessary following nurse triage)
- Extremely safe care for patients (rare under-referrals of 1:600 calls)
The Schmitt-Thompson clinical team works closely with the CDC and physicians and nurses experienced in telephone triage to update the nurse triage guidelines annually, ensuring the content is compliant, current, and evidence-based. Using these rigorously reviewed nurse triage guidelines, our clinical team has the needed support to provide the best care to patient callers.
Contact AccessNurse for Medical Call Center Services
Utilizing gold-standard Schmitt-Thompson Triage Guidelines, our team drives high-quality services and give our clients peace of mind knowing that their patients will always receive clinically sound advice and dispositions. Click here to learn how AccessNurse can support your organization with medical call center services.
