Response to Active Shooter Incidents for Hospitals & Healthcare Facilities
We hear about a shooting in a school, college, university, hospital or other workplace setting every few months now, in both large and small towns. Just watch your local news and you will see that over the past few years there has been a significant increase in the number of indiscriminate shootings of innocent people in hospitals and other public buildings.
Perhaps the most feared event for any security director is an act of workplace violence and, in particular, an active shooter scenario. One market that has seen its share of deadly workplace shootings is the healthcare industry. In recent months we have seen that hospitals throughout the nation have experienced active shooter and hostage incidents. For example, in December 2012 an armed gunman shot a police officer and two employees before he was fatally shot by police in a Birmingham, Alabama hospital; in June 2012 a surgeon fatally shot his ex-girlfriend inside a hospital in Buffalo, New York; in February 2012 an employee shot two of his supervisors after a disciplinary incident earlier that day in a New Britian, Connecticut hospital; in May 2011 a patient shot and killed a transplant surgeon in a parking garage at Florida Hospital and then committed suicide; and in September 2010 a disgruntled visitor, upset with the treatment his mother was receiving at Baltimore's Johns Hopkins Hospital, shot a doctor before killing his mother and then himself inside the hospital. A few weeks prior to that incident, a former soldier, seeking mental health care, took three people hostage at Winn Army Community Hospital in Georgia. Furthermore, numerous hospital workers nationwide have expressed concerns about violent assaults against healthcare workers. These are just a few of the shooting-related incidents that have occurred at hospitals in recent history.
Increasing numbers of administrators, supervisors, and other hospital staff are becoming seriously concerned that, despite wide media coverage of repeated shootings in public workplaces, there is little or nothing in place to effectively prevent a similar incident from happening to themselves or their family members in their local hospitals and healthcare facilities if an individual decided to stage such an attack. These events happen over and over in almost exactly the same way with minor variations in details, but hospital-based preventive measures and responses have changed little due to the lack of appropriate training. Though no one can truly be prepared for an active shooter attack, there are ways that hospital staff can be better prepared if such a situation occurs.
The first people on the scene of these types of incidents in a healthcare facility are the facility officials - administrators, security staff, doctors, nurses, and other employees. This has put the healthcare facility employee in the forefront of a crisis. This training course is designed for administrators, public safety/security officers, and other healthcare facility officials who may be initially faced with handling a crisis within their facility until a law enforcement presence can be established.
Violent incidents, including but not limited to: acts of terrorism, an active shooter, assaults, or other incidents of workplace violence can occur in the hospital or other healthcare facility setting or in close proximity with little or no warning.
“Active Shooter” is a phrase used by law enforcement that describes an armed person whose activity is immediately causing serious injury or death and has not yet been contained. The active shooter subject uses deadly physical force on individuals and continues to do so while having unrestricted access to additional victims.
The Response to Active Shooter Incidents for Hospitals & Healthcare Facilities training seminar is designed to bridge the gap between responding law enforcement officers and hospital public safety/security officers, administrators, and other healthcare facility personnel in an active shooter situation. The presentation is designed to assist hospital personnel in their ability to: prevent; report; and protect themselves and their patients from an active shooter during the critical moments before the arrival of police and what to expect from the officers once they are on scene. It will prepare participants to provide law enforcement officers with the necessary information to properly respond to these extremely difficult situations.
This seminar will include a classroom presentation covering the following areas: Overview and historical examination of active shooter violence in hospital and healthcare campus environments; an examination of lessons learned; the differences between the active shooter and hostage taker; behavioral pre-cursors; threat assessments; facility lockdowns; and rapid deployment response by healthcare facility security/public safety personnel. The training also includes exercises to be used to facilitate discussions about the development of effective crisis management protocols used to deal with crisis situations and demonstrate the lessons learned.
Hospitals and healthcare facilities interested in hosting this seminar are encouraged to contact us to discuss how we can customize the presentation to best meet the needs of your healthcare facility and utilize your current Emergency Operations/Safety Plan in our exercises. Critical guidance will be outlined, including strategies to help you and members of your organization survive an active shooter situation whether in the hospital, other healthcare facility, or any other venue. The purpose of the healthcare facility exercise is to coordinate hospital and regional command centers in order to exercise safety, security and other plans in response to an Active Shooter incident. The exercise will test and evaluate operational procedures for internal and external plans. This exercise enables participants to assess current response capabilities to an Active Shooter incident, to identify strengths and weaknesses, and to identify future training needs. The exercise will focus on critical decisions and coordination of participants necessary to respond to an Active Shooter event. For additional information about the benefits of hosting this course at your location, contact us today. When violence erupts in a healthcare facility, the outcome and events of the incident are unpredictable. Injury or death of building occupants, lawsuits, property damage, and diminished trust in the facility by patient, staff and the community are just a few of the possible consequences. The risk for violence is difficult to predict and almost impossible to eliminate. This course provides instruction on ways hospital staff can reduce potential and minimize the impact of violent situations specifically involving an active shooter incident.
All course instructors are current law enforcement officers with specialized instructor certifications and experience in active shooter response training.
“Active Shooter” is a phrase used by law enforcement that describes an armed person whose activity is immediately causing serious injury or death and has not yet been contained. The active shooter subject uses deadly physical force on individuals and continues to do so while having unrestricted access to additional victims.
The Response to Active Shooter Incidents for Hospitals & Healthcare Facilities training seminar is designed to bridge the gap between responding law enforcement officers and hospital public safety/security officers, administrators, and other healthcare facility personnel in an active shooter situation. The presentation is designed to assist hospital personnel in their ability to: prevent; report; and protect themselves and their patients from an active shooter during the critical moments before the arrival of police and what to expect from the officers once they are on scene. It will prepare participants to provide law enforcement officers with the necessary information to properly respond to these extremely difficult situations.
This seminar will include a classroom presentation covering the following areas: Overview and historical examination of active shooter violence in hospital and healthcare campus environments; an examination of lessons learned; the differences between the active shooter and hostage taker; behavioral pre-cursors; threat assessments; facility lockdowns; and rapid deployment response by healthcare facility security/public safety personnel. The training also includes exercises to be used to facilitate discussions about the development of effective crisis management protocols used to deal with crisis situations and demonstrate the lessons learned.
Hospitals and healthcare facilities interested in hosting this seminar are encouraged to contact us to discuss how we can customize the presentation to best meet the needs of your healthcare facility and utilize your current Emergency Operations/Safety Plan in our exercises. Critical guidance will be outlined, including strategies to help you and members of your organization survive an active shooter situation whether in the hospital, other healthcare facility, or any other venue. The purpose of the healthcare facility exercise is to coordinate hospital and regional command centers in order to exercise safety, security and other plans in response to an Active Shooter incident. The exercise will test and evaluate operational procedures for internal and external plans. This exercise enables participants to assess current response capabilities to an Active Shooter incident, to identify strengths and weaknesses, and to identify future training needs. The exercise will focus on critical decisions and coordination of participants necessary to respond to an Active Shooter event. For additional information about the benefits of hosting this course at your location, contact us today. When violence erupts in a healthcare facility, the outcome and events of the incident are unpredictable. Injury or death of building occupants, lawsuits, property damage, and diminished trust in the facility by patient, staff and the community are just a few of the possible consequences. The risk for violence is difficult to predict and almost impossible to eliminate. This course provides instruction on ways hospital staff can reduce potential and minimize the impact of violent situations specifically involving an active shooter incident.
All course instructors are current law enforcement officers with specialized instructor certifications and experience in active shooter response training.