The Digital Clinician® is an Expert System that uses artificial intelligence to match the rules and knowledge base of classical Emergency Medicine Triage with the rapidly changing and multiform presentations of clinical encounters with unknown patients. Whether the encounter is real or simulated; pre-hospital; acute; outpatient or inpatient, The Digital Clinician® supports the clinician in working smart. To work smart, the clinician must screen clinical presentations based on both severity and likelihood.

The odds for enhancing diagnostic validity within any population, whether that of personal care or mass casualties, is thereby increased. And, with a Mass Casualty Incident, effective and non-prejudicial Triage is mandatory under International Law. It has been proven that every clinician requires considerably more information than is stored within the best of practitioner minds.

The current threat from this knowledge gap is escalating due to expected surges of patients from the increasing gap between professional resources and demands created by both the Affordable Health Care Law and contingent needs of national preparedness. This threat is occurring within a concurrent healthcare environment of increasing delegation of clinical responsibilities to professionals with less training.

The interactive process between clinician and The Digital Clinician®, whether it is embedded for simulation training within the E-patient; a wearable computer for medical communications and coordination in first response or the Electronic Health Record, seamlessly tracking walk-ins and inpatient transfers, can significantly help fill the threatened knowledge gap.

By doing so it can enhance provider effectiveness; legal and personal security; cash flow and staffing decisions for surges of unknown patients, whether for personal care or population-based Triage of Mass Casualty Incidents and epidemics.