Meet Our Authors
Barton Schmitt, MD
Barton Schmitt, MD wrote the first book on pediatric telephone triage in 1980. He is a primary care pediatrician and served as the Medical Director of the Pediatric Call Center at Children’s Hospital Colorado, 1988-2019.
Dr. Schmitt’s CV Highlights:
Faculty, Department of Pediatrics, University of Colorado School of Medicine, 1970-2023. Now retired and Professor Emeritus.
Medical Director, Pediatric Call Center, Children’s Hospital Colorado, 1988-2019. Continues to serve on Quality Improvement Committee.
Attending Physician, Child Health Clinic for Residents, 1970-2023. Continues to teach pediatric residents in the clinic setting.
Medical Director, Diagnostic Dilemma Clinic, 1974-2019.
Author of five integrated sets of clinical content for use in telehealth triage software:
Pediatric After-Hours Telehealth Triage Guidelines for healthcare organizations and medical call centers (1994-present).
Pediatric Office-Hours Telehealth Triage Guidelines for health systems and office practices (1996-present).
Pediatric Symptom Checker; web-based and mobile self-triage and self-care guides for parents (2000-present).
Pediatric Care Advice; end-of-call instruction handouts for parents on over 400 common pediatric health problems (1990-present).
SymptomScreen; priority screening guides for scheduling agents and front desk staff (2020-present).
Author of more than 100 articles and books for physicians, nurses and parents.
The first book on pediatric telephone triage, Pediatric Telephone Advice, in 1980.
Pediatric Telephone Protocols - Office Version. 17th Edition, 2021. American Academy of Pediatrics Publications.
Two award-winning child care books for parents; My Child is Sick! 2021 and Caring for your Sick Child, 2023; AAP Publications.
Honors received from the American Academy of Pediatrics
Anderson Aldrich Award for contributions in Child Development, 1994
Education Award for contributions in Pediatric Education, 2004
Education:
Degree in Chemical Engineering, Yale University
Medical Degree, Cornell University Medical College
Pediatric Residency, University of Minnesota Hospitals
Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics
David Thompson, MD
David Thompson, MD is board certified in both Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine. He also served as Chief Medical Information Officer for ECI Healthcare Partners, providing strategic guidance and leadership in the areas of technology, medical coding, compliance, and education.
Dr. Thompson’s CV Highlights:
Strong interests in the areas of telehealth triage, quality improvement, patient satisfaction, consumer self-care and digital health, including:
Development of symptom checker, health bot, consumer engagement, natural language processing, and telehealth applications.
Development of databases and educational tools to promote quality improvement for medical call centers and emergency departments.
Benchmarking work with medical call centers, aggregating data from more than 6.5 million telephone triage calls.
Over thirty years of clinical emergency medicine experience and emergency department leadership positions.
Chair and/or member of hospital based and national quality assurance committees.
Chief Medical Information Officer for ECI Healthcare Partners, providing strategic guidance and leadership in the areas of technology, medical coding, compliance, and education.
Author of two integrated sets of clinical content, for use in telehealth triage software:
Adult After-Hours Telehealth Triage Guidelines for healthcare organizations and medical call centers (2000-present).
Adult Office-Hours Telehealth Triage Guidelines for health systems and office practices (2000-present).
Author of Adult Telephone Protocols: Office Version 5th Edition (2021) published by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Additional writing and speaking:
Author of numerous medical articles, with several in two fields of special research interest to him: patient satisfaction and chief complaint coding.
Lectures in the areas of telehealth triage, professional coding, quality improvement, and patient satisfaction.
Education:
Bachelor of Science in Engineering from the University of Illinois
Medical Degree, University of Illinois College of Medicine, Chicago IL
Board-certified in Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine
Fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians
“Please express my regards and appreciation to Bart and David for their continued efforts with the guidelines and the unquestionable clinical integrity. We truly value our long standing partnership with Schmitt-Thompson!”
— Cindy Reed, President, AccessNurse, Knoxville, TN