With the costs associated with providing quality patient care rising faster than reimbursement rates, many healthcare organizations are facing an urgent need to identify and realize financial savings across the board. At the same time, the stakes for ensuring the safety and security of their staff and patients have never been higher as workplace violence is driving many healthcare professionals to consider quitting their professions and oftentimes distracting those who remain from their focus on providing quality patient care. Many healthcare organizations are finding that working with a security consultant helps them create a more effective security program and achieve significant savings in security-related costs. 

The ideal security consultant is an independent, neutral professional, without any financial links to security vendors. Because such a professional has no preconceived agenda and because the consultant sees the organization’s current situation with an outsider’s fresh pair of eyes, the consultant often finds creative and efficient solutions to the organization’s safety and security needs, identified through a security assessment.

When conducting a security assessment, security consultants use their experience to identify security risks that are not currently being mitigated or that could be mitigated more efficiently. Once these risks are identified, the consultants’ expertise and independence allow them to recommend the best approaches to address these deficiencies.

Security, at its core, is an anticipatory discipline. When potential threats are identified prior to their occurrence and appropriate mitigation measures are applied, the chances of a security incident are reduced. Therefore, a thorough security assessment is an essential first step in building a robust and efficient safety and security program that is tailored to the specific needs of a particular organization. 

Financial savings realized by right-sizing security personnel

A security assessment often finds that the security budget of a healthcare organization is not optimally allocated. For example, instead of investing in training that would enhance the capabilities of a smaller number of security personnel, the organization hires additional people or invests in technological solutions that are unnecessary.

The following two case studies illustrate how an assessment can reduce an organization’s security costs by hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Case Study #1: Identifying and Addressing Root Cause Rather Than Increasing Staffing

The employees in the emergency department (ED) of a hospital had expressed concern over their safety after assaults on staff members by patients, and stated that they felt unsafe at work even through the hospital was already staffing their ED with a security officer around the clock, and additional security staff were spending over 600 hours a month in the ED assisting staff with “combative” patients. The nearly 9.0 Security FTE allocated to the ED were costing the hospital nearly $500,000 per year, but the nurses’ union representative demanded that the organization contract with the local police department to add 24/7 police presence in the ED. Such a contract would have cost the hospital an additional $800,000 per year, stretching the hospital’s security budget to the breaking point.

During a  security assessment, interviews with patient care and security staff showed that complaints were mostly due to a nearly universal level of discomfort working with patients suffering from mental illness. This level of discomfort was partly due to situations in which staff had to defuse potentially violent situations or protect themselves from assaults.

In light of these findings, rather than immediately contracting with the police department, the hospital decided to invest in training for their ED staff in crisis de-escalation, self defense techniques, and developing more effective strategies for working with patients suffering from mental illness. Additionally, the hospital created a position for a psychiatric nurse to serve as resource for the staff during the times of day when the largest volume of high acuity behavioral health patients were being seen. Once these measures were implemented, the hospital not only saved money by not contracting with the police but was also able to reduce security personnel time spent in the ED by 90%. At the same time, assaults on staff decreased by nearly 50%, the patient experience improved significantly with a decrease in complaints and a marked improvement in HCAPS scores from patients suffering from behavioral health complaints, and staff satisfaction scores increased.

Case Study #2: Reducing the Cost of Security Staff Turnover

A mid-sized healthcare system was consistently operating at nearly double their allocated staffing budget, requiring major budget cuts to be made elsewhere in the security operating budget and leading to gaps in addressing many security concerns. An in-depth analysis identified significant turnover in security staff – 45% annually – as the primary driver of the budget shortfalls. The time spent in recruiting, interviewing, and training of new security officers, in addition to the overtime worked by existing staff to ensure appropriate staffing levels to cover for vacant positions, was costing the organization approximately $65,000 per new hire, amounting to nearly $2.2 million annually. In addition to these budgetary issues, the high turnover placed extreme strain on the organization’s staffing capacity, led to decreased morale for remaining staff, and created gaps in institutional knowledge. 

The security consultants found that the turnover was driven by security officers leaving to earn higher wages in the corrections industry and recommended raising wages to match the local corrections market. While the salary increases cost nearly $500,000 annually, they had an immediate effect on turnover, reducing it from 45% to 20% annually, cutting the annual costs associated with turnover from $2.2 million to well under $1 million – a net savings of over $750,000. In intangible terms, the reduced turnover increased security morale, helped the department manage staffing capacity, and created an environment where long-term employees could grow with the department.  

While there can be no guarantee that a review of an organization’s security program will result in cost savings, an outside expert looking at the program without preconceived biases very often will identify significant efficiencies that can be implemented with relative ease. 

Financial savings realized by preventing workplace violence

Creating a more secure environment can pay huge dividends not only in safety, staff morale, and patient satisfaction, but it can also have enormous financial benefits. For example, a recent survey of healthcare workers in critical care settings has found that more than 25% are considering quitting over workplace violence concerns. 2022 statistics show that the average turnover-related costs for one staff RN was $52,350 while the turnover of a single physician can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in recruitment costs and incentives as well as millions of dollars in lost revenue.  

Working with a security consultant on an assessment and on implementing measures that lead to a safer working environment can put a meaningful dent in staff turnover, freeing up resources that must otherwise be allocated to recruiting replacement staff.

Identifying sources of funding for safety and security programs

In addition to helping an organization identify efficiencies and measures to increase safety and security, a security consultant can often recommend appropriate grants and other funding opportunities for the organization’s security needs. Moreover, including the recommendations from a thorough security assessment in a request for funding increases the chances that the funding will be granted because it demonstrates that the request is based on facts and data, and that the funds will be spent effectively. 

If your organization is considering a review of its security program, we can help. Reach out to Drew Neckar, MBA, CPP, CHPA, COSECURE’s Principal Consultant and a board-certified security and crime prevention professional with more than 25 years of experience as a practitioner, consultant, instructor, and trainer in the healthcare security industry.