6 Areas to Address to Access Health-Care Business

Hospitals have critical challenges that can be solved via access control. Meet this market’s needs by keeping facilities safe while also boosting the value provalue proposition by enhancing convenience and efficiencies.

Near-Field Communications (NFC) technology is now being added to a growing number of mobile handsets to enable access control as well as many other applications. Thus, more and more health-care organizations are considering adapting the “bring your own device” (BYOD) trend to access control and having users deploy their own smartphones as their access control credentials. Once the mobile credential is downloaded, users open the app and tap their smartphone to the reader in the same way they use an ID card.

As an alternative to hardwired locks, a wireless electronic locking system, extremely popular in hospitals during retrofits, provides flexibility and simplicity of installation with the same enhanced security and lockdown capabilities of a hardwired system.

For many employees, including doctors, this is much easier than searching for a card. It was estimated that more than 285 million NFC-enabled smartphones were sold in 2013 and in excess of half the phones sold in 2015 will be NFC-capable.

Those not willing to make an upgrade today to a smart credential solution should consider incorporating multitechnology readers. These read magnetic stripe and proximity cards as well as smart cards (and smartphones) concurrently so that, when the switch to smart credentials comes about, they will not have to tear out and re-install readers.

3. Assure Emergency Lockdown

Violence in health-care environments is on the rise. Whether it’s an active shooter situation, a domestic incident spilling over into the emergency department or patient/family violence against staff members, lockdown procedures can help contain and control the situation while keeping other patients and staff from being put in harm’s way.

Some recent advances in facility security have been shown to go a long way in helping to maintain perimeter access and control intra-facility movement during an emergency. First of all, an access control system with strategically placed readers and electronic locking solutions has become an increasingly popular way to enable the instantaneous lockdown of a facility in the case of an emergency.

Secondly, what makes an access control system so helpful in emergency situations is the ease by which administrators can deny access to the perimeter or any intra-facility area, thereby giving the administrator autonomy in regard to traffic flow during an emergency situation. When implemented correctly, the access control software provides a simple way to centrally manage user authorization and door status within a facility.

As an alternative to hardwired locks, a wireless electronic locking system, extremely popular in hospitals during retrofits, provides flexibility and simplicity of installation with the same enhanced security and lockdown capabilities of a hardwired system. Wireless access control system installation is fast and easy with minimal disruption to patient care areas, and can easily be integrated with other electronic hardware for an integrated life-safety and security solution.

By incorporating credential strategies into a lockdown plan, lockdown control not only pertains to staff members but can also create a path to effectively managing vendors, contractors, volunteers and visitors during an emergency.

One lockdown issue with some wireless technologies has been the potential for communications delay from the head-end system. With many wireless solutions, access control decisions are downloaded by the host into the lock only five to six times per day. Access control decisions are managed within the locks (as is the case with traditional offline locks) to minimize communication from the lock to the host and conserve batteries. However, such limited (not real-time) connectivi
ty with the host limits the locks’ ability to receive urgent commands from the host.

There can even be problems with legacy 900MHz wireless technology platforms. Oftentimes, a command to immediately lock down could be ignored by the lock for up to 10 minutes or more. However, with newer modular wireless locks using 900MHz, a patent-pending “wake up on radio” feature works in parallel with the 10-minute heartbeat. Without waking up the entire lock or reducing battery life, it listens for complementary commands every one to 10 seconds and responds. Thus, it can be programmed where 10 seconds is the longest it will take to initiate lockdown.

Also, by incorporating credential strategies into a lockdown plan, lockdown control not only pertains to staff members but can also create a path to effectively managing vendors, contractors, volunteers and visitors during an emergency.

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