Ethical Patient Prioritization in Disaster Triage: A Protocol for a Systematic Review

Background: Disasters are medically defined as events in which the demands for patients’ care far exceed the available resources. In such situations, triage and rationing of limited resources are inevitable. A decision regarding triage needs not only scientific guidelines but also an ethical framework and supporting policies. This study aims to provide a comprehensive review of the criteria for ethical decision-making in disasters triage. Materials and Methods: Medline (Via pubMed.com), Scopus, Web of Science, and ProQuest databases will be searched from 1990 to July 2017 using a defined search strategy. Other search resources include Google Scholar, World Health Library, Global Ethics Library, Gray Literature Report website, and World Health Organization (WHO), which will be searched using a modified search strategy. The manual search will be conducted in two journals with the highest number of retrieved titles in the Scopus search and the reference list of selected articles. Study selection, quality assessment, and data extraction will be done by the first author, and the second reviewer will check the results, and probable disagreements will be resolved through discussion and review by a third reviewer.  Results: This systematic review will identify all factors a triage officer should be considered when he or she would like to make an ethical decision. Conclusion: Transparency and consistency are two main procedural ethical values of disaster triage. The result of this review could be used to make a consistent decision in disaster triage.