triage

American  

[tree-ahzh] / triˈɑʒ /

noun

• triages
  plural

1. the process of sorting victims, as of a battle or disaster, to determine medical priority in order to increase the number of survivors.

2. the determination of priorities for action.

   She began her workday with a triage of emails.

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adjective

1. of, relating to, or performing the task of triage.

   a triage officer.

verb (used with object)

triaged, triaging

1. to act on or in by triage.

   to triage a crisis.

triage British  

/ ˌtriːˈɑːʒ, ˈtriːˌɑːʒ, ˈtraɪ- /

noun

1. (in a hospital) the principle or practice of sorting emergency patients into categories of priority for treatment

2. the principle or practice of sorting casualties in battle or disaster into categories of priority for treatment

3. the principle or practice of allocating limited resources, as of food or foreign aid, on a basis of expediency rather than according to moral principles or the needs of the recipients

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• triages
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of triage

First recorded in 1925–30; from French: “a sorting,” from tri(er) “to sort” ( cf. try) + -age -age

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Explanation

Grouping patients based on the severity of their injuries and the likelihood of their survival is called triage. In a triage situation, urgent cases are seen by doctors first, and non-life-threatening emergencies go last. You can also apply the sorting and prioritizing of triage to more general situations. If you're overwhelmed with homework, you can perform triage by organizing it into subjects and prioritizing assignments based on their due dates. The word triage comes from the French word trier meaning to sort. Although the medical sense is now the most common, it wasn't used that way until World War One.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

triage triages triaged triaging

Before the minister announced the pause, BBC News NI had contacted all five trusts this week to ask about the future of their telephone triage services.

From BBC ● Nov. 6, 2026

Brenhouse added that this year’s market shocks and credit turbulence served as a stress-test to businesses like Octus as clients turned to the company’s tools to triage portfolio risk.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 3, 2026

As Karen and I triage our possessions, I have discovered the joys of life in a tidy house.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 8, 2026

Rankine’s new attempt at triage focuses on her long friendship with a person identified only as “the theorist.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 31, 2026

A triage nurse found her condition stable and classified her as “high priority.”

From "Class Matters" by The New York Times

The company developed a metric called “Mean Time to Adapt,” which measures how quickly an organization identifies, triages and fixes vulnerabilities once discovered.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 10, 2026

The team preps trees when possible ahead of advancing flames and triages those that have faced the fire.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 7, 2021

For every patient that telemedicine triages, avoiding the need for an in-person appointment, another slot is opened up for someone who may have needed it more.

From Slate ● Mar. 17, 2020

He triages each based on how solvable they are.

From Washington Times ● Oct. 10, 2015

In the months following the shooting, university counselors provided more than 700 mental health triages, spoke to classes, visited survivors in the hospital, fielded 120 calls from parents and provided other services.

From Washington Post ● Apr. 13, 2012

"I got to hospital, triaged within 15 minutes, it was all amazingly quick."

From BBC ● Sep. 5, 2026

It is understood the 39-year-old, who was triaged on arrival complaining of a headache, waited for more than seven hours to be seen by a doctor.

From BBC ● Feb. 9, 2024

Maui County Fire Chief Brad Ventura at a news conference spoke of firefighting resources having to be triaged Tuesday to “what was most important at the time.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 14, 2023

"This is the only hospital still accepting injured and we're getting more every day. Some go into surgery, others get triaged, but the capacity is very low," he said.

From Reuters ● Apr. 19, 2023

Many were triaged in the war zone and then treated at a military medical facility in Landstuhl, Germany, before being flown to the United States.

From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama

Higher-order organisms have developed a way of triaging that information, selecting what is relevant to our safety and our survival, and making instant decisions about how to allocate our resources and our attention.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026

“We have a lot of resources in that area, and they’re triaging the best they can,” an operations team member replied.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 12, 2025

A quick way to measure methane leaks is essential for triaging newly discovered UOWs, and also for efforts to plug known wells.

From Science Daily ● Dec. 4, 2024

“Our teams are assisting in triaging emergency cases and managing stabilized patients admitted in the medical tents,” MSF said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

From Washington Times ● Oct. 12, 2023

The lightness he'd felt fled him, and he began the rotten business of triaging his in-box.

From Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow

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