Nclex disaster management

If i'm understanding your question (and sorry if I'm not): you always assume NCLEX is referring to an ideal hospital where everything is handled by the books.

So if there is a disaster and you are handling patients, treat will-die-without-help-will-live-with-it first, then will-live-without-help next, and leave the will-die-no-matter-what folks last.

According to Kaplan, on the NCLEX you should assume that the system is not overwhelmed unless it is specifically stated in the question that it is overwhelmed, if that makes sense.

I just read about this in my ATI Medical-Surgical RN book. There is the usual triage which you would perform under normal conditions and there is triage under mass casualty. I would think if they wanted you to triage under mass casualty it would say something about a disaster occuring. Otherwise i would assume you triage under usual conditions.

So I would presume for a triage situation that it is not overwhelmed. In a disaster the system can be not overwhelmed or overwhelmed. Is there something that will be written if the system is overwhelmed, and I am to triage based on this.[/quote']

I believe if it says there has been a disaster or mass casualty then you do into overwhelmed disaster mode. At that point you would base care of most injured yet still able to be helped if treated ASAP, followed by next most critical, etc.

Unless it says mass casualty or disaster, NCLEX is a utopia in which everything is perfect, you have enough help and no one is overwhelmed. I hope that makes sense.