Hospital alerts community to changes in infant security

BY JANET GIBSON

CEO Vickie Kaminski updated Sudbury Regional Hospital’s board of directors earlier this month on improved security in the Labour, Delivery, Recovery and Postpartum Unit. The hospital made the changes following the abduction of an infant in November 2007, the type of abduction the U.S.-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children called “very, very, very rare.”

The hospital spent $143,000 on the Hugs Infant Protection bracelets, magnetic door locks and an enhanced surveillance camera system, which came with annual operating costs of $15,000.

Immediately following the abduction, the hospital audited the security in the unit using guidelines put out by the centre.

“No equivalent Canadian-based guidelines were available for reference,” Kaminski noted. A committee chaired by vice-president of clinical programs David McNeil spoke to other hospitals and researched information available on the subject.

The committee found “opportunities to improve in all areas,” Kaminski said. “However the biggest opportunity for improvement was in the physical security systems.”

The hospital now sends staff home if they’re not wearing their photo ID and gives parents handouts with tips on keeping newborns safe.

Fortunately, infant abductions from health care facilities are rare, officials said. Consider these statistics provided by the centre and the RCMP: Between 1983 and 2008, 254 infants were abducted in the U.S., 123 from health care facilities. In Canada, seven infants were abducted from hospitals between 1991 and 2007, five by strangers.

Security-wise, the first priority for a health care facility is to train staff on protocols, teach them the profile of a typical abductor and install cameras that record, said Cathy Nahirny, the centre’s administrative manager for training and outreach.

“If they choose to install an infant security system, that’s wonderful,” she said.

Magnetic door locks, which require a person to swipe a card or punch in a code to open a door, are “pretty standard operating procedure in the U.S.,” Nahirny said.

The centre has a free educational program called Safeguard Their Tomorrows that is available to hospitals on DVD. “We don’t want these incidents to occur, period,” she said.

Parents should think twice before publishing a birth announcement. “They have to know there’s a risk involved,” she said. “Our world is different now. You have to be far more aware of your personal surroundings.”