Area hospitals on top of security requirements

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) - New state-mandated security requirements at hospital emergency rooms are no worry to Charlottesville-area healthcare providers.

According to a state law that took effect at the beginning of July, Virginia emergency rooms must have round-the-clock security or police presence.

The law also requires emergency departments, or ED’s to do an independent risk assessment and develop a security plan.

“Probably 75% of workplace violence occurs in medical centers and ED’s are hot spots for that,” UVA Medical Center Police Captain Matthew McBee said.

The bill requires at least one security officer in the ED at all times. McBee says the Medical Center has had that for years.

“Right now, at any given time, we have a four trained security officers in our emergency department that are specifically assigned to the emergency department and one police officer that’s assigned 24/7,” Captain McBee said.

The same goes for Augusta Health, according to it’s Director of Security Scott Smith.

“We already had security, private security here in place. So we were a little bit ahead of it,” Smith said.

The bill was originally introduced July 1, 2023, but officially went into effect July 1, 2024.

UVA Medical Center ran it’s risk assessment and developed a security plan back in 2023 and now just needs to update it.

“We’re actually a year ahead of most institutions that I know of,” Captain McBee said.

Smith says Augusta Health also ran a risk assessment and is working to implement its updated security plan.

“We are very close to having everything into place as the bill requires,” he said.

29News also reached out to Sentara Health to see if it was up to speed with the new code.

“Sentara is in full compliance with state requirements for hospital emergency plans,” Senatara spokesperson Dale Gauding wrote in response. “Our hospitals have robust crisis response plans, which include mandatory annual training for staff and periodic drills. We have a systemwide workplace violence prevention program for all sites of care and business, including mandatory visitor badging. Sentara strives to maintain a balance between being welcoming and secure for the safety of our patients, visitors, and teams.”

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