BACKGROUND: This study was designed to evaluate the safety of a self-administered triage tool. MATERIALS: Ninety-five patients older than 14 years who presented to Memorial Hermann Hospital emergency room (ER) with chief complaint of abdominal pain were included in the study. Their ER disposition and final diagnoses were logged into a database. The assigned disposition and top three diagnoses by the triage tool for each patient were also logged into the database. An emergency physician blinded to the actual disposition reviewed all cases and provided a disposition for each patient. RESULTS: The system disposed 51.1% of cases appropriately and under-disposed 4.4% of cases. Comparison between the system and the emergency physician shows that all cases under-disposed by the system are also under-disposed by the physician.