Hospital Emergency Codes are used in hospitals worldwide to alert staff to various emergency situations. The use of codes is intended to convey essential information quickly and with a minimum of misunderstanding to staff, while preventing stress or panic among visitors to the hospital. These codes may be posted on placards throughout the hospital, or printed on employee/staff identification badges for ready reference. Hospital emergency codes are frequently coded by colour, and the colour codes denote different events at different hospitals and are not universal.