Patient-staff safety applications: the evaluation of blue code reports

Blue code systems (BCS) are communication systems that ensure the most rapid and effective resuscitation when a patient is in respiratory or cardiac arrest. A hospital employee faced with the situation of a cardiopulmonary arrest (CPA) starts the system by dialing 6666 from any phone in the hospital. We created a five-person team that includes a doctor, nurse, anesthesia technician, stretcher officer and security guard. The purpose of this study is to share our experiences in initiating the use of the BCS in our hospital.

In our hospital, the records of calls that were made by Callvision BCS were analyzed retrospectively from May 2010 to the end of January 2011.

A total of 474 calls were made using the blue code system. Of those calls, 402 (84.5%) were determined to be inappropriate calls. The remaining 72 calls were responded to. Of the 72 patients who were treated, 21 were discharged after they were hospitalized in the service or intensive care unit, 45 cases resulted in exitus, and 5 cases were referred to the Ataturk University faculty of medicine.

The BCS has achieved its goal. The discharge rate of 29.5% that we achieved is a successful result.