The Nov. 17 rollover accident involving a Durango School District 9-R bus triggered emergency responses from a series of state and local agencies and institutions. By all accounts, all performed splendidly. What the incident showed, however, is the need for greater public understanding of how emergencies are handled.

As the Herald reported online that evening, and in print Nov. 18, a first responder described the injuries sustained as “mild to moderate.”

That prompted a flurry of online criticism in what one first responder called a “trial by social media.” As one comment on the Herald’s website put it, “So a broken clavicle, broken leg, concussion are ‘minor injuries’ in grade schoolers? Not if your [sic] the child or the parents.”

How that writer came by that information while the incident was ongoing is unclear. Moreover, its accuracy is questionable. Mercy Medical Center has said there were broken bones, but for privacy reasons gave no more details. There has been no official word of any of the students suffering a concussion.

More to the point, “mild to moderate” is not a description coined by a headline writer or someone’s offhand remark. It is an official characterization made by a trained first responder, and it has specific meaning that is consistent within the medical community.

Underlying any emergency response is the concept of triage. In its simplest form, the idea is that patients can be assigned to one of three categories. There are those who will survive if nothing is done immediately, those who will die no matter what, and those whose outcome is dependent on how soon and how well they are treated – in other words, the ones that most need help. The same kind of calculation can be made in situations in which no one is about to die.

It is about assigning available resources. How the injuries are described by first responders on the scene gives everyone in the system an idea as to what must be done. Are more ambulances needed or more help? Do the police have to redirect or control traffic? Does the hospital need to free up an operating room? Should more doctors be called in and what kind? Is a helicopter warranted? And does anybody need to be flown elsewhere?

All involved respond to the initial estimates of the number and severity of casualties. Their responses are fine-tuned as more information is acquired, but in any potential medical emergency, the most precious resource is time, and the more they have to prepare, the better the likely outcome.

That parents would be distraught and focused on their own child is only natural. Elementary students injured to any degree in a school bus crash would of course be terrified. And the online commenter was right – if you are the parent or the child in that situation, there was nothing minor about any of this.

But neither was there anything dismissive about a first responder describing the injuries as “mild to moderate” or the Herald paraphrasing that as “minor injuries.” Given that all of the students were treated and released, both were medically accurate.

Communication within any profession can include jargon and shorthand. And it can sometimes sound clipped or even cold. Above all, though, talk among first responders and within the medical community must be accurate and as precise as possible.

On Nov. 17, that communication – and everything else – worked as it should. A bus full of kids rolled over and crashed down a hill, and everyone went home that night.