Protecting Healthcare Staff From Patients
April 10, 2015 - Desiree J. Hanford
One of the biggest safety concerns facility managers have is the treatment of staff by patients, family members and other visitors, according to an article on the FacilitiesNet website.
Technology offers quicker and more efficient means of summoning help on any floor of a hospital, not just the emergency room. For instance, Rush University Medical Center in Chicago is using panic devices, which allow staff members to push a button and get help in their current location.
Rush also uses radio frequency panic devices on staff identification cards, allowing security staff to know what room a staff member is in.
In addition, several large healthcare organizations have opted for central command centers when security staff numbers have been cut, where security personnel can monitor all facilities from one location.
Protecting Healthcare Staff From Patients, Family Members:
One of the biggest safety concerns facility managers have is the treatment of staff by patients, family members, and other visitors. Protecting the workers is vital. Remember that emotions often run high in a healthcare facility, with patients not feeling well and family members having conversations about end-of-life care. Such issues add stress to already tense situations, says Lauris Freidenfelds, security director at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.
Patients who act out are disruptive and violent, throwing items, yelling, screaming, and sometime hitting staffers, including security officers, Freidenfelds says. The emergency room is a particularly volatile area, with some patients coming in with chemical or psychological issues, he adds.
"The hospital is really an extension of the home sometimes, so the stresses that exist there extend to us," he says.
Hospital emergency room staffs often must deal with people whom police have dropped off because they don't know what else to do with them, says William Sako, senior vice president of Rolf Jensen & Associates Inc. Some of these people are incoherent, and ER staffs are left to figure out what do with them. Several hospitals have safety officers standing by to make sure the individuals don't get violent with the people treating them. The facilities have created rooms off the emergency rooms in which to put these so-called stand-bys, allowing staff to watch five to eight individuals at a time, Sako says.
The labor and delivery room is another area where violence has occurred, says Freidenfelds.
Technology gives a healthcare facility's staff quicker and more efficient means of summoning help on any floor of a hospital, not just the emergency room. Rush Medical is using panic devices, which allow staff members to push a button and get help in their current location without needing to return to a nurse's station, Freidenfelds says.
Rush also uses radio frequency panic devices on staff identification cards, allowing security staff to know what room a staff member is in. There have been instances, Freidenfelds says, where difficult patients didn't allow a nurse to leave a room, but the combination of panic device and identification card allowed security to locate the nurse and get help there.
Healthcare facilities are also putting nurses in pairs so that one can stay with a patient and the other can get help if necessary, Sako says. Some facilities have a digital phone that allows a nurse or another staff member to press just one button, he says.
Technology is also helping to fill gaps caused by decreased headcounts. Although hospitals typically have control rooms that alert security officers to a problem, more of those rooms are empty because hospitals need officers walking the floors, Sako says. Several large healthcare organizations have opted for central command centers, where security personnel can monitor all facilities from one location, eliminating the need for a control room in every building.
"You can then give the roving officers a tablet or iPad, giving them the entire security system on that device," Sako says. "They can look at the tablet and see where an incident is occurring and decide how to respond. If someone gets a call saying roughnecks in the ER are starting a fight, they can get over there. When that public safety officer is on the way there, they can call up a camera in the ER to see how to approach."
Appropriate Technology Is Key To Hospital Security:
By Desiree J. Hanford September 2014
All types of facilities are starting to rely more on technology, particularly in the areas of safety and security, and nowhere is this more evident than in healthcare. Hospitals, clinics, and medical offices are high-traffic areas, with staff, patients, and visitors moving in and out at all hours of day and night. The goal for facility managers should be balancing the use of technology, maintaining a secure environment, and allowing staff and visitors to move through a facility without too much hassle.
Healthcare facility managers have multiple safety and security concerns, especially given that many parts of their facilities are open to visitors. Technology has made addressing those concerns easier, but facility managers must select technology that is effective, meets the facility's needs and demands, and isn't too hard to understand or use. It must also be a financially sound investment.
"When you look at technology, you have to go in with the mindset that it has to be a long-term solution — will it be relevant in three years? — and not just a fad," says David LaRose, director of safety/security and EM Management at Lakeland Regional Medical Center in Lakeland, Fla. "Look at the lines of people who want a new cell phone. You have to ask if you're really going to get something out of the technology."
Evaluating Options
When Lakeland recently replaced and upgraded its safety and security technology with new access control and closed-circuit television, LaRose was diligent during the vetting process in getting opinions from his peers at other institutions about the products and vendors he and his staff were considering. He wanted quality products that could meet the demands of the medical center as it expands and that the information technology department felt were a good fit.
Lauris Freidenfelds, security director at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, agrees it's important to take a "real world" approach to technology. Facility staffs sometimes "fall in love" with technology and move ahead without thinking about the overall operations, he says. Facility managers need to look at the operations first and then select technology that's appropriate for the building, not the other way round, he says, adding that he has seen many people buy technology that functions poorly with a facility's operations and is abandoned. A certain technology, he says, "may not be the sexiest thing on the street, but it might be the best thing for the situation."
One area where security technology is making protection easier is tracking. For example, tags have been used to keep track of infants, but they only worked in a specific area of a hospital. With the use of WiFi, though, an infant can now be tracked across an entire facility, allowing security to intercept an individual who is not authorized to care for the baby, says William Sako, senior vice president of Rolf Jensen & Associates Inc. It's an example of technology making security much better and easier, he says.
Hospitals Weigh Access Control And Intrusion Detection:
By Desiree J. Hanford September 2014
Healthcare facilities also use access control, intrusion detection, and video analytics for safety and security. All of these tools have pros and cons.
Access control, says Lakeland's LaRose, is a fundamental to protecting assets. Every institution has made significant investments in people and property, so it's crucial to identify threats, such as an individual getting unauthorized access to an area or missing equipment, he says. Given the freedom nurses, doctors, and staff need to do their jobs, it's important to be able to control who has access to areas around the facility, LaRose says.
Ideally, electronic access control would replace all mechanical locks and keys, not only because it allows security personnel to restrict where people are allowed, but also because it's easier to deactivate a card than rekey a lock, Freidenfelds says.
"You lose a key and you lose the security there," he says. "Very few people will rekey that lock. But if you lose the access control card, we'll deactivate the cards but the security remains."
Intrusion detection, including alarms and motion detectors, are helpful in signaling when someone has entered a prohibited area, but facility managers worry that too many false alarms will lead staffs to ignore them.
Video analytics aren't used extensively in healthcare facilities for a variety of reasons, ranging from price to quality to ease of use. The technology, says Sako, requires "much hand holding and tweaking."
No matter which technology facility managers choose, they'll need to continue to balance the appropriate level of technology with patient and staff convenience. That balance, LaRose says, requires having all stakeholders — facility managers, patient-care advocates, risk-management employees, and security staff — at the table early in the decision-making process.
Desiree Hanford, a contributing editor, is a freelance writer and a former assistant editor of Building Operating Management.
For additional healthcare related information, we encourage you to visit Healthcare Facilities Today at https://www.healthcarefacilitiestoday.com
