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Triage is a term used to describe the process of categorizing multiple victims or mass casualty patients into different treatment and evacuation categories [1, 2]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The burden of trauma is increasing worldwide [1], but in a very uneven fashion [2, 3]. It is decreasing in the developed world, to the point that trauma surgery as a career is sought by very few surgical residents in the United States [4, 5], while resources are overburdened in the developing world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Thoracic injury constitutes one on the most heterogeneous groups of trauma pathology, and the one that encompasses the most organs and systems within its jurisdiction. It is also one of the most lethal: Of the 180 000 deaths per year in the United States in the 1990s, thoracic injury was solely responsible for 25% and played a major role in another 25% [1]. Thoracic injury also accounted for 37% of the soldiers killed in action in Vietnam, before the widespread use of Kevlar vests. Out of 1,198 penetrating injuries to the heart in South Africa, only 6% of victims presented to hospital alive [2]. Clearly, the immediate recognition and management of life-threatening injuries must be within the grasp of any doctor treating trauma patients, however infrequently this may be [3]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]