Assessment Of Saudi Emergency Department Nurses’ Knowledge About Triage System and Correlated Factors

Abstract

Background: Emergency services classify patients based on the severity of their diagnoses using a triage system. One of the skills a nurse working in an emergency department needs to have is triage. Aim: This study aims to examine the nurses' knowledge regarding triage and identify the variables that affect emergency nurses' knowledge of the triage systems. Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed from April to June 2022, on (48) nurses working in the emergency department. (ED) at Makkah hospital in Saudi Arabia. A self-administered questionnaire with non-probability purposive sampling was used to gather the data by sociodemographic data and triage knowledge. Results: The findings revealed that 68.8% were female and 45.8 % with a mean age of 31.79. Nurses revealed moderate levels of triage knowledge. Bachelor science nursing degree (p = 0.005, B= 10.659), years of experience for ≥5 years (p = 0.002, B =10.670), and training courses on triage (p = 0.001, B= 12.418) were affecting factors with statistically significant on emergency nurses’ knowledge. Conclusions: The results showed that emergency nurses knew about triage at a moderate level. The knowledge of nurses was influenced by their training, years of experience, and qualifications. Therefore, recommendations for training sessions and programs should be held and taken into account the connected increases in emergency nurses' knowledge of triage to improve the quality of nursing care and patient outcomes.