Triage designates clients by who can best use limited resources, not worst need

Evidence

An appropriate model for differentiation among clients in people processing is “triage.” The term has its origins in a battlefield context. It refers to the decisions of medical personnel to place wounded soldiers in one of three categories: mortally wounded, with little hope of recovery; lightly wounded, not requiring immediate attention; and seriously wounded, but likely salvageable if medical attention is provided promptly. By concentrating on the last category prudent triaging provides a guide to optimizing the use of medical resources in battle. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 777

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clear technical definition of triage as a resource-optimization model that favors salvageable over most-needy.
• XREF: connects to: Clients and workers inhabit structurally incompatible frames of individual need versus aggregate processing — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 459