Steps to Improve Infant Security

DURHAM, N.C. – Just weeks after a Louisburg, N.C., woman attempted to snatch a baby from a mother’s room at Duke University Hospital’s Birthing Center, hospitals across the country are investigating the strength of their own infant security protocols and systems.

 

The abductor is now in custody and facing criminal abduction charges, due in large part to the quick response of Duke Hospital nursing staff, according to authorities.

 

Similar situations are becoming more and more rare, according to data from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. There have been 127 infant (birth to 6 months) abductions at healthcare facilities between 1983 and 2009, only three of which occurred last year.

 

In healthcare facilities, the NCMEC reports the No. 1 place for infant abductions is the mother’s room, where 73 abductions occurred over the last 26 years, followed by nurseries (17 abductions), pediatric units (17 abductions), and elsewhere on hospital grounds (20 abductions).

 

The findings aren’t surprising, says Jeff Aldridge, founder and CEO of Security Assessments International, a hospital security consultancy, and a former safety director for the University of North Carolina hospitals.

 

“Parental education is one of the most important tasks that we do in hospitals,” says Aldridge, who has worked with more than 600 facilities. “[The mother] really is the first line of defense.”

 

Abductors target the mother’s room because when a mother enters a hospital, she becomes subservient, Aldridge says.

“She’s told what to do when at the hospital,” says Aldridge, adding that mothers in hospitals are programmed to recognize and respond to authority figures. Abductors take advantage of that disposition, stealing scrubs and medical equipment to appear more like doctors or caregivers to their victims.

 

Aldridge has witnessed the hospital infant security industry grow from nearly non-existent to a business of producing cutting-edge devices. Most common are Radio Frequency ID tags.

 

Once an RFID tag is attached to an infant, the tag transmits regularly to a system connected with the maternity unit, says Kevin Smith, product manager with Stanley Healthcare Solutions, a supplier of infant security systems.

 

“This tag continually listens for devices placed at exists, and for the presence of mother tags,” Smith says. “The tag also checks that it is correctly applied to the infant, and regularly transmits its own status to a network of receiving devices placed throughout the OB department.”

“If the tag detects a nearby exit or an unauthorized removal attempt, it will send out an immediate burst of messages via the network of receiving devices, notifying the software,” Smith says. “The software will then respond as configured by the hospital by declaring an alarm, activating network devices at exits to engage door looks, pulling up CCTV footage, displaying response procedures, etc.”  

 

Over the years, RFID tags have continued to evolve, becoming more integrated into the other aspects of the maternity ward’s overall security structure. Hospital staffers are now able to use proximity cards to log into their terminal’s infant security program to review CCTV footage, Smith says. This CCTV footage can then be authenticated by Video Forensic Experts and used as evidence against the perpetrator.

 

Bands are now equipped with cut-band technology and tamper-proof strips, ensuring that they can’t be removed or broken without triggering alarms. Tags are designed to transmit every few seconds to the primary system so if their signals are intercepted, alarms will be set off. Tag-to-tag association has also grown, allowing for mother and child tags to be synchronized to avoid mother-child mix-ups.

“This bonded pair of tags provides local and automatic notification to mother and nurse that the correct infant has been returned to the correct mother,” Smith says. 

 

At Proven Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet, Ill., James Cureton, director of security, is responsible for ensuring the safety of the patients and staff of the 440-bed, 963,000-square foot hospital.

 

“For any system to be effective, there are a lot of things that have to go into it,” says Cureton, who has worked in security at the hospital for six years. “Foremost, any good infant abduction system has to have good policies and procedures backing it up.”

 

Regular maternity and pediatric staff training sessions and drills should be held to prepare for a potential abduction.

“We educate patients to never give children to someone who doesn’t have appropriate ID,” Cureton says. “Patients don’t give their babies to someone without those IDs.”

The cost of an infant security system varies by the physical size and layout of the facility, with a typical range between $150,000 and $300,000 for a medium-sized OB department, Smith says. Factors that can affect installation include the age of the facility and the materials used in construction.  

The next evolution of infant security is integrating the networks into the day-to-day clinical workflow of the OB department, Smith says.

“The census list of tagged infants in the system is becoming an interactive electronic ‘whiteboard’ to assist departmental workflow,” he says. “Customized fields like nurse and room assignments, doctors, or risk factors enable the hospital to provide specific information to nurses, doctors and managers.”

 

Hospitals will also see the system software migrate from only being available at nurses’ station terminals to useable on hand-held devices, allowing staff to interact with the security system without leaving their patients side, says Smith.

 

Even with the current technology, many hospitals are still behind the curve, says Aldridge, who estimates that less than 50 percent of facilities nationwide are equipped with infant security systems.