Compare START and SALT triage systems and indicate when each would be used in disaster settings.

• A. START prioritizes pediatric needs and evolving conditions.
• B. START uses a color-tag system for prioritization of care; SALT is identical.
• C. SALT ignores pediatric considerations.
• D. START prioritizes immediate life-threatening conditions with a simple color-tag system; SALT adds pediatric considerations and evolving conditions.

Answer: (D)

In mass casualty triage, the main idea is to quickly identify who needs immediate life-saving care and who can wait, so scarce resources are used where they save the most lives. START is designed for rapid, field triage and uses a simple color-tag system to categorize patients by how urgently they need care: those with immediate life-threatening conditions are tagged red, those with delayed needs yellow, minor injuries green, and those unlikely to survive given the situation black. The emphasis is speed and broad applicability in large crowds, typically without diving into detailed pediatric considerations or ongoing re-evaluation.

SALT builds on that by adding a more structured approach and flexibility. It retains a color framework but introduces a Sort–Assess–Lifesaving Interventions–Treatment/Transport sequence. This means responders not only sort by urgency but also explicitly account for performing a few lifesaving steps before final triage decisions, and it includes steps tailored for pediatric patients and for patients whose conditions may change as treatment begins. In other words, SALT recognizes that children require different criteria and that triage decisions can evolve with ongoing assessment and interventions.

So the best description is that START prioritizes immediate life-threatening conditions with a simple color-tag system, while SALT adds pediatric considerations and evolving conditions to allow more nuanced, ongoing assessment.