Trauma Routing Algorithm for Pediatrics

The North Carolina Trauma Registry will identify pediatric trauma patients between 0 and 18 years of age who presented directly to North Carolina Level 1 Trauma Centers from the field after sustaining injury from January 1st, 2013 and October 2017.

The analysis will be a retrospective cohort study by nature of the data set. Final methodology will be determined after Institutional Review Board approval and enlistment of statistical support through the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. Clinical and non-clinical factors will first be summarized with univariate analysis to provide a descriptive overview of the study population. These factors will include number of case-patients, demographics, scene address/location, time of injury, EMS agency involved, EMS call times, transport mechanism, time of transport, distance of transport, geographic area of injury, mechanism of injury, severity scores, Glasgow Coma Score, vital signs, receiving hospital name, and other variables. Similarly, interventions and outcomes will be compared between study groups through such factors such as length of emergency department stay, emergency department disposition, time to operating room, intubation status on arrival, administration of blood products, days of hospital stay, days of intensive care unit stay, days on ventilator, if viable organs were procured post-mortem, and mortality at given time points. Outcomes will be compared through regression analysis or related means.