Using the Delphi method to establish pediatric emergency triage criteria in a grade A tertiary women’s and children’s hospital in China

BACKGROUND: We aimed to establish simplified and quantifiable triage criteria in pediatric emergency care, improving the efficiency of pediatric emergency triage and ensuring patient safety. METHODS: We preliminarily determined the pediatric emergency triage criteria with references to pediatric emergency department characteristics and internationally recognized triage tools after literature review and discussion. The final determination of the triage criteria was reached after two rounds of Delphi surveys completed by18 experts from 3 hospitals in China. RESULTS: Both round 1 and round 2 surveys had a 100% response rate. The overall expert authority coefficient in the two rounds of surveys was 0.872. The experts had 100% enthusiasm for participating in the surveys. Kendall’s coefficients of concordance for conditions/symptoms in patients triaged to level 1, 2, 3, and 4 were 0.149, 0.193, 0.102, and 0.266, respectively. All p-values were less than 0.05. The coefficients of variation in conditions/symptoms, vital signs, and the Pediatric Early Warning Score (PEWS) ranged between 0.00 and 0.205, meeting the inclusion criteria. The pediatric emergency triage criteria containing conditions/symptoms, vital signs, PEWS scores, and other 4 level 1 indicators, 51 level 2 indicators and 23 level 3 indicators were built. The maximum waiting time to treatment for the patients triaged to level 1, 2, 3, and 4 was immediate, within 10 min, within 30 min, and within 240 min, respectively. CONCLUSION: The pediatric emergency triage criteria established in this study was scientific and reliable. It can be used to quickly identify the patients requiring urgent and immediate care, thereby ensuring the priorities for the care of critically ill patients. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12913-022-08528-8.