• Michael Frink, Christian Zeckey, Philipp Mommsen, Carl Haasper, Christian Krettek, and Frank Hildebrand.
• Trauma Department, Hanover Medical School, Carl-Neuberg-Str. 1, 30625 Hanover, Germany. michaelfrink@web.de
• Injury. 2009 Nov 1;40 Suppl 4:S5-11.

AbstractThe management of polytraumatised patients remains challenging in spite of advances and improvements in trauma care in recent decades. Trauma systems require enormous staff resources as well as technical equipment. Internal and external quality management processes are necessary to identify weak points and improve treatment quality. Continuous training of all professionals involved in trauma care is necessary to assure high quality, up-to-date therapy in patients with multiple injuries. Standard operating procedures such as prehospital trauma algorithms and clinical management protocols (ie, ATLS) can help to standardise and compare treatment of patients suffering from major trauma. In this overview, we describe the development and current state of our trauma department. Differences in our cohort of polytraumatised patients compared to other facilities and current strategies for initial treatment of these patients are also discussed.

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