Table 1.

Characteristics of excluded studies after abstract reading

Study	Reason for exclusion
Burns et al. 1989 [ 6 ]	Prehospital pathway where the patients received thrombolysis
Pell et al. 1992 [ 7 ]	The study evaluated an in-hospital triage system
Davis et al. 1996 [8]	A comparison between patients and physicians acceptance of risk
Millar-Craig et al. 1997 [9]	Prehospital pathway where the patients received thrombolysis
Prasad et al. 1997 [10]	Prehospital pathway where the patients received thrombolysis
Thomas et al. 1997 [11]	Prehospital pathway where the patients received thrombolysis
Sandler 1998 [12]	Prehospital pathway where the patients received thrombolysis
Villiers et al. 2007 [13]	No control group
Ostrzycki et al. 2008 [14]	The aim was to investigate time delay in treatment of STEMI patients in four different groups
Zhang et al. 2009 [15]	The study evaluated the effect of in-hospital triage
Cheung et al. 2010 [16]	The study evaluated the effect of in-hospital triage
Sorensen et al 2011 [17]	The aim of the study was to bypass the local hospital and transfer patients direct to PCI center
Abrahamyan et al.2012 [18]	The study evaluated the effect of in-hospital triage
Alexandrescu et al. 2012 [19]	The study investigated the impact of inter-hospital transfer