They take calls from patients who are trying to get in touch with their physician after usual office hours, for specific health concerns or urgent medical needs. The triage nurse must assess the severity of the patient's symptoms and then guide them to the appropriate level of care. Triage nurses do not diagnose clients over the phone. Their function is to determine the severity of the callers complaint using a series of algorithms developed by a coordinated effort of physicians and nurses, direct them to the appropriate emergency services if necessary, recommend the suggested medical follow-up based on their assessments and established triage protocols, and provide health information. Many tele-nurse programs routinely handle appointment booking for the physician offices they contract with, both during office hours and after.
Many call centers function in a similar way to a switchboard service.
Telephone headsets are used and each nurse has a computer that is programmed with triage algorithms, or algorithms in a manual form. Demographic data is assessed also, such as age, gender, height, weight, etc. The algorithms are designed to assist the nurse in completely and accurately assessing the client, without jumping to conclusions given certain symptom sets. One of the difficulties facing inpatient nurses who do telephone triage is that they tend to assume the worst when it comes to interpreting the complaints of the client. Triage nurses must take into consideration all the different elements that are affecting the client and their decision to seek medical attention.