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Table 1 Grading of clinical severity and target time to initiate patient management (South African Triage Scale), Gondama hospital, Bo, Sierra Leone

From: Offering general pediatric care during the hard times of the 2014 Ebola outbreak: looking back at how many came and how well they fared at a Médecins Sans Frontières referral hospital in rural Sierra Leone

Colour*

Target time

Management

Red

Immediate

Take to resuscitation room for emergency management

Orange

<10 min

Refer for very urgent management

Yellow

<1 h

Refer for urgent management

Green

<4 h

Refer to designated area for non-urgent cases

Blue

<2 h

Refer to doctor for certification

  1. If emergency clinical signs are found, the patient is assigned a red priority level and taken straight to the resuscitation area without delay. If no emergency clinical signs are present the patient is assessed for very urgent (orange) or urgent (yellow) clinical signs. Patients in the orange and yellow category should be seen within 10 and 60 min respectively. Non-urgent cases are classified as green and are to be seen within 4 h. If a patient arrives dead or dies upon arrival, they are considered ‘blue’ cases
  2. *adapted from the South African Triage Scale (SATS), Training Manual 201226