Objective: To develop a valid and reliable assessment tool able to measure quality of communication, patient safety and efficiency in out-of-hours (OOH) telephone triage conducted by both general practitioners (GP) and nurses. Design: The Dutch KERNset tool was translated into Danish and supplemented with items from other existing tools. Face validity, content validity and applicability in OOH telephone triage (OOH-TT) were secured through a two-round Delphi process involving relevant stakeholders. Forty-eight OOH patient contacts were assessed by 24 assessors in test-retest and inter-rater designs. Setting: OOH-TT services in Denmark conducted by GPs, nurses or doctors with varying medical specialisation. Patients: Audio-recorded OOH patient contacts. Main outcome measures: Test-retest and inter-rater reliability were analysed using ICC agreement , Fleiss’ kappa and percent agreement. Results: Major adaptations during the Delphi process were made. The 24-item assessment tool (Assessment of Quality in Telephone Triage – AQTT) measured communicative quality, health-related quality and four overall quality aspects. The test-retest ICC agreement reliability was good for the overall quality of communication (0.85), health-related quality (0.83), patient safety (0.81) and efficiency (0.77) and satisfactory when assessing specific aspects. Inter-rater reliability revealed reduced reliability in ICC agreement and in Fleiss’ kappa. Percent agreement revealed satisfactory agreements when differentiating between ‘poor’ and ‘sufficient’ quality). Conclusion: The AQTT demonstrated high face, content and construct validity, satisfactory test-retest reliability, reduced inter-rater reliability, but satisfactory percent agreement when differentiating between ‘poor’ and ‘sufficient’ quality. The AQTT was found feasible and clinically relevant for assessing the quality of GP- and nurse-led OOH-TT. KEYPOINTS Comparative knowledge is sparse regarding quality of out-of-hours telephone triage conducted by general practitioners and nurses. The assessment tool (AQTT) enables assessment of quality in OOH telephone triage conducted by nurses and general practitioners AQTT is feasible and clinically relevant for assessment of communication, patient safety and efficiency. AQTT can be used to identify areas for improvement in telephone triage

Background: To explore and compare safety, efficiency, and health-related quality of telephone triage in out-ofhours primary care (OOH-PC) services performed by general practitioners (GPs), nurses using a computerised decision support system (CDSS), or physicians with different medical specialities. Methods: Natural quasi-experimental cross-sectional study conducted in November and December 2016. We randomly selected 1294 audio-recorded telephone triage calls from two Danish OOH-PC services triaged by GPs (n = 423), nurses using CDSS (n = 430), or physicians with different medical specialities (n = 441). An assessment panel of 24 physicians used a validated assessment tool (Assessment of Quality in Telephone Triage-AQTT) to assess all telephone triage calls and measured health-related quality, safety, and efficiency of triage.

ObjectivesOut-of-hours (OOH) telephone triage is used to manage patient flow, but knowledge of the communicative skills of telephone triagists is limited. The aims of this study were to compare communicative parameters in general practitioner (GP)-led and nurse-led OOH telephone triage and to discuss differences in relation to patient-centred communication and safety issues.DesignObservational study.SettingTwo Danish OOH settings: a large-scale general practitioner cooperative in the Central Denmark Region (n=100 GP-led triage conversations) and Medical Helpline 1813 in the Capital Region of Denmark (n=100 nurse-led triage conversations with use of a clinical decision support system).Participants200 audio-recorded telephone triage conversations randomly selected.Primary and secondary outcome measuresConversations were compared with regard to length of call, distribution of speaking time, question types, callers’ expression of negative affect, and nurses’ and GPs’ responses to callers’ negative affectivity using the Mann-Whitney U test and the Student’s t-test.ResultsCompared with GPs, nurses had longer telephone contacts (137s vs 264 s, p=0.001) and asked significantly more questions (5 vs 9 questions, p=0.001). In 36% of nurse-led triage conversations, triage nurses either transferred the call to a physician or had to confer the call with a physician. Nurses gave the callers significantly more spontaneous talking time than GPs (23.4s vs 17.9 s, p=0.01). Compared with nurses, GPs seemed more likely to give an emphatic response when a caller spontaneously expressed concern; however, this difference was not statistically significant (36% vs 29%, p=0.6).ConclusionsWhen comparing communicative parameters in GP-led and nurse-led triage, several differences were observed. However, the impact of these differences in the perspective of patient-centred communication and safety needs further research. More knowledge is needed to determine what characterises good quality in telephone triage communication.

ObjectivesTo compare the quality of communication in out-of-hours (OOH) telephone triage conducted by general practitioners (GPs), nurses using a computerised decision support system and physicians with different medical specialities, and to explore the association between communication quality and efficiency, length of call and the accuracy of telephone triage.DesignNatural quasi-experimental cross-sectional study.SettingTwo Danish OOH services using different telephone triage models: a GP cooperative and the medical helpline 1813.Participants1294 audio-recorded randomly selected OOH telephone triage calls from 2016 conducted by GPs (n=423), nurses using CDSS (n=430) and physicians with different medical specialities (n=441).Main outcome measuresTwenty-four physicians assessed the calls. The panel used a validated assessment tool (Assessment of Quality in Telephone Triage, AQTT) to measure nine aspects of communication, overall perceived communication quality, efficiency and length of call.ResultsThe risk ofpoorquality was significantly higher in calls triaged by GPs compared with calls triaged by nurses regarding ‘allowing the caller to describe the situation’ (GP: 13.5% nurse: 9.8%), ‘mastering questioning techniques’ (GP: 27.4% nurse: 21.1%), ‘summarising’ (GP: 33.0% nurse: 21.0%) and ‘paying attention to caller’s experience’ (GP: 25.7% nurse: 17.0%). The risk ofpoorquality was significantly higher in calls triaged by physicians compared with calls triaged by GPs in five out of nine items. GP calls were significantly shorter (2 min 57 s) than nurse calls (4 min 44 s) and physician calls (4 min 1 s). Undertriaged calls were rated lower than optimally triaged calls for overall quality of communication (p<0.001) and all specific items.ConclusionsCompared with telephone triage by GPs, the communication quality was higher in calls triaged by nurses and lower in calls triaged by physicians with different medical specialities. However, calls triaged by nurses and physicians were longer and perceived less efficient. Quality of communication was associated with accurate triage.

ObjectivesWe aim to explore undertriage and overtriage in a high-risk patient population and explore patient characteristics and call characteristics associated with undertriage and overtriage in both randomly selected and in high-risk telephone calls to out-of-hours primary care (OOH-PC).DesignNatural quasi-experimental cross-sectional study.SettingTwo Danish OOH-PC services using different telephone triage models: a general practitioner cooperative with GP-led triage and the medical helpline 1813 with computerised decision support system-guided nurse-led triage.ParticipantsWe included audio-recorded telephone triage calls from 2016: 806 random calls and 405 high-risk calls (defined as patients ≥30 years calling with abdominal pain).Main outcome measuresTwenty-four experienced physicians used a validated assessment tool to assess the accuracy of triage. We calculated the relative risk (RR) forclinically relevantundertriage and overtriage for a range of patient characteristics and call characteristics.ResultsWe included 806 randomly selected calls (44clinically relevantundertriaged and 54clinically relevantovertriaged) and 405 high-risk calls (32 undertriaged and 24 overtriaged). In high-risk calls, nurse-led triage was associated with significantly less undertriage (RR: 0.47, 95% CI 0.23 to 0.97) and more overtriage (RR: 3.93, 95% CI 1.50 to 10.33) compared with GP-led triage. In high-risk calls, the risk of undertriage was significantly higher for calls during nighttime (RR: 2.1, 95% CI 1.05 to 4.07). Undertriage tended to be more likely for calls concerning patients ≥60 years compared with 30–59 years (11.3% vs 6.3%) in high-risk calls. However, this result was not significant.ConclusionNurse-led triage was associated with less undertriage and more overtriage compared with GP-led triage in high-risk calls. This study may suggest that to minimise undertriage, the triage professionals should pay extra attention when a call occurs during nighttime or concerns elderly. However, this needs confirmation in future studies.