Clin Med
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Quality of care in intensive care and surgery has benefited from establishing comparative standards. At present there is no accepted tool to compare outcomes for emergency admissions in internal medicine. ⋯ Three parameters with poor reproducibility were identified. The SCS has several potential applications: identification of patients with low risk of death suitable for early hospital discharge; early identification of patients with a high risk of death, who will require care in critical care areas (or specialist palliative care); and benchmarking of acute medical departments internationally in a similar way to how APACHE II scoring has been used in critical care units worldwide.