Walking free and clear into a locked behavioral unit

I couldn’t help but think of all the security officers out there when I heard a story from a friend over the weekend who went to visit a patient at a locked behavioral unit in a suburban hospital.

As my friend approached the unit, someone coming out of it held open the door for her, so she was able to enter without anyone on staff letting her in. She walked over to a check-in desk and was basically ignored by workers on the unit who were having a private conversation, so she signed herself in. She had a bag with a wrapped gift in it that was never checked by employees, even though there was a check box for staff to fill out on the sign-in sheet stating that a staff member had checked any bags.

Finally, my friend left the check-in desk without any staff acknowledgment after she saw the patient whom she was looking for in the corridor and walked over.

Yikes — those are a lot of holes in the unit’s security policies. I’d be interested to hear whether any security folks out there have run into similar problems spot-checking locked units in their own hospitals.