Anyone who passes through the doors of a hospital should feel safe – whether they’re a patient, a visitor, a medical professional or one of the many non-medical workers essential to keeping a modern hospital running. The idea is self-evident given the sacrosanct role hospitals play in our society, but that doesn’t mean it’s self-sustaining.
That’s why hospital security is so important, and it’s why professionals in the field deserve a suite of tools and tech that is cohesively crafted to multiply their efforts rather than inhibit them. Here’s why your hospital or healthcare network needs to update its approach to security, and why Axon is the best partner to bring your practices and processes into the future.
Why it’s more important now than ever to elevate hospital security
As the last few years have proven, healthcare workers have never been a more essential part of our society. Yet healthcare workers are five times more likely than other professionals to be the victims of workplace violence. This chilling disproportion has only worsened since the pandemic placed heretofore unseen strain on the healthcare systems of the world, with nursing associations reporting significant increases in workplace violence.
No one should have to go to their job in fear of life and limb – a terrible notion on its face, and one that has knock-on effects on stress, job performance, employee retention and beyond. Hospital security professionals can’t fully eliminate the factors that make healthcare workers more likely to be exposed to workplace violence, but they can use tools built on proven technology to do more with the staff and resources they already have.
Investing in improvements to hospital security can help fight employee churn through improved perceptions of safety, and also prevent potential bad PR by reducing the potential for misunderstood or mishandled incidents. Rather than being an unavoidable drain on operating budgets for healthcare settings, the benefits of better security yield a clear return on investment, both in operating expenses and in outcomes for patients who receive care from employees who felt safe clocking in this morning (or afternoon or night).
The Axon Enterprise suite of solutions gives hospital security a smart and efficient set of de-escalation and incident management tools. Used in concert with the fundamentals your team already brings to bear, these tools help safeguard the lives of hospital guards, staff and patients. If you’re ready to find out whether Axon is a fit for your healthcare facility, read our breakdown of Axon for Hospital Security.
How Axon’s offerings are a force multiplier for hospital security
Curious to learn more about how Axon Enterprise can help improve incident prevention and response in a healthcare context? Here are how three of our products can augment your current approach to security.
Axon Body 3 improves interactions
Body-worn cameras aren’t just for police officers. They provide both immediate and long-term benefits for incident response as well as prevention in a hospital security context:
Improves behavior on both sides of the camera: Accountability cuts both ways. When people know they’re being recorded, they’re more likely to behave courteously and professionally when interacting with security officers.
Aids response for emergent events: Information is a hospital security department’s most precious resource during an emergent event. Being able to directly monitor video feeds from every security official on the premises in one central location means more information for better responses.
Supports growth after the fact: By presenting security departments with an unbroken record of each security officer’s actions, supervisors can make individual employee recommendations as well as conduct deeper analysis of facility-wide security trends, strengths and areas for improvement.
Axon Body 3’s superior low-light performance for indoor spaces, reduced motion blur, and reliable LTE connection make it the best choice in body-worn cameras for security officers.
TASERs empowers de-escalation
Incident response should always begin with minimal force, and that’s no different in a hospital. But when non-physical de-escalation techniques don’t yield the necessary results, security officers need to be empowered to stop threats in their tracks without taking a life or endangering their own. There is no tool better built for this purpose than a TASER.
The result of decades of innovation, TASER 7 gives users more confidence to contend with threats at close range (where 85% of deployments occur) thanks to a 93% increased probe spread. Its rapid arc technology lets darts fly straighter and faster, compressing clothing on contact to ensure proper deployment. And its dock and walk functionality means all officers need to do to ensure their weapon’s logs are recorded is place their weapon in its charger.
Axon Evidence speeds reporting and breaks down data silos
Healthcare security professionals do their best work when they’re making their rounds or carrying out their duties at key locations. Accountability and information sharing are paramount, but every moment officers spend filling out lengthy forms and paperwork is a moment they could be making your hospital a better place to work and recover. Axon Evidence speeds data ingest and management using a single, secure system to make your reporting processes faster and more effective.
Taken together with the automatic logging capabilities of both Axon Body 3 and TASERs, each security officer is automatically equipped with powerful tools to gather data on both the routine and emergent operations of security staff. Axon Evidence makes it easy to assemble that data into actionable insights, as well as to share necessary information with law enforcement when and where it’s required.
The Axon Enterprise ecosystem is built to help security teams at healthcare institutions of all sizes outperform their headcount by focusing on performing their daily duties instead of administrative work. It gives teams the tools and information they need to keep the most essential people in the modern workforce safe and able to concentrate on the life-saving services that only they can provide. If you’d like to learn more about how our enterprise security solution can help your healthcare facility, contact us today.
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