Table 2.

Workload predictions and sensitivity and specificity in predicting death within 24 hours for National Early Warning Score (NEWS) and local EWS for unselected respiratory population

NEWS band	Mandated escalation to:	% of observations in each band	Median no per day (range)	Sensitivity for predicting death within 24  hours	Specificity for predicting death within 24  hours
0	Nil	17.86	32 (3–75)	100.00	0.00
1–4	Nurse	67.34	180 (21–457)	99.44	15.09
5–6	Doctor	8.82	60 (10–184)	88.64	74.51
7 or more	Registrar	5.97	38 (2–158)	68.53	91.16

NUH EWS band	Mandates escalation to:	% of observations in each band	Median no per day (range)	Sensitivity for predicting death within 24 hours	Specificity for predicting death within 24 hours
0	Nil	56.11	174 (20–409)	100.00	0
1–2	Nurse	31.83	99 (16–300)	95.49	56.32
3	Nurse/doctor	5.39	16 (1–116)	76.65	88.24
4–5	Doctor	4.74	14 (1–55)	63.33	93.58
6 or more	Registrar	1.94	5 (0–41)	41.91	98.24

NUH, Nottingham University Hospital.