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Background

Hospitals in Oregon and Washington are committed to safe, quality health care for their communities. One way to promote safety and reduce harm is to standardize emergency code calls in hospitals throughout both states. The purpose of emergency code calls is to communicate an emergency quickly and to mobilize expert assistance.

Physicians and staff often work in multiple hospitals, each with their own emergency code designations. It is easy to become confused and use the wrong code in an emergency. This has resulted in harm to patients in Washington and several other states. Nine states have responded to the lack of uniformity among health care facilities by standardizing emergency codes in their states. The American Hospital Association has recommended a set of codes for hospitals across the nation to use. 

At the request of member hospitals, the Oregon Association of Hospitals & Health Systems, Oregon Patient Safety Commission, and Washington State Hospital Association formed a taskforce to standardize emergency code calls under the leadership of the Dr. Lawrence Schecter, chief medical officer, Providence Regional Medical Center Everett. Both states surveyed member hospitals to determine the amount of variation in emergency codes. Although many hospitals used the same code for fire (code red), tremendous variation existed for codes representing respiratory and cardiac arrest, infant and child abduction, and combative person, reinforcing the importance of standardization to support our physicians and staff who strive to deliver safe patient care.

In our deliberations and decisions regarding the types and names of codes to standardize, we adhered to the following principles:

  • the types of codes should be limited given that people have limited memory capacity  and fewer codes would be easier to remember;
  • codes should be consistent with national standards where possible to foster clear communication in the event of a national disaster and to address the multiple states also working on this same initiative;
  • definitions should be consistent, clear and brief;
  • in order to prevent confusion among hospital staff, the colors adopted should be different from the colors adopted for the hospital color-coded alert wristbands where possible;
  • names for each code should reflect clarity and brevity; and
  • hospitals may add modifiers to codes as appropriate, for example, location of the emergency.

Support for hospitals for standardization of emergency codes is being provided by the Northwest Organization of Nurse Executives, Oregon Association of Hospitals & Health Systems, Oregon Patient Safety Commission, and Washington State Hospital Association.

Emergency Code Recommendations:

 

The following code designations for emergency identification in health care organizations are recommended code names:

 

Code Name

Emergency Situation

CODE RED

Fire

CODE BLUE

Heart or Respiration Stopping

CODE ORANGE

Hazardous Material Spill or Release

CODE GRAY

Combative Person

CODE SILVER

Person with Weapon/Hostage Situation

AMBER ALERT

Infant and Child Abduction

EXTERNAL TRIAGE

External Disaster

INTERNAL TRIAGE

Internal Emergency

RAPID RESPONSE TEAM

Rapid Response Team

“CODE NAME” CLEAR

To Clear a Code

Note: It is important that location be included with any code announcement.

Although this is a voluntary effort, hospitals in Oregon are encouraged to adopt these emergency codes by December 31, 2009.

 

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503-636-2204 | Fax: 503-636-8310
info@oahhs.org
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