Cost-Conscious O.C. Hospitals Confront Security Dilemma

Monday’s incident involving a gunman who walked into the emergency room at County-USC Medical Center in Los Angeles has raised questions about security at hospitals in Orange County.

None of the county’s 41 hospitals that are part of the Hospital Council of Southern California are equipped with metal detectors. In addition, few hospitals have large enough budgets to consider buying sophisticated detectors, said David Langness, a spokesman for the council.

“What that means is hospitals sometimes have a constant and somewhat difficult security problem,” Langness said.

“It is a topic that’s always on our minds,” said Monica Statz, a spokeswoman at Anaheim Memorial Hospital.

Only two hospitals in Southern California, Martin Luther King Jr. General Hospital in Southwest Los Angeles and Veterans Affairs Medical Center in West Los Angeles, have installed metal detectors, both after incidents there, Langness said.

A doctor was stabbed at Veterans, and the appearance of armed gang members at King has risen dramatically, he said.

“The subject of security is a big and controversial issue,” Langness said, adding that at a recent hospital conference in Riverside, a seminar on security received substantial attention by those attending.

In the last two years, Southern California hospitals have experienced drive-by shootings, assaults and rapes.

“We’re not free from the troubles of society. And, in fact, the troubled society comes right to the front door,” Langness said.

While the hospital community is well aware of potential violence, it faces a dilemma.

“Yes, it’s a budget item,” Langness said, “but also we want to be open, caring institutions. We don’t want to become walled fortresses.”

According to a prepared statement, the staff at UCI Medical Center in Orange is “concerned about our colleagues at County-USC Medical Center.”

However, UCI Medical Center differs from County-USC, said Don Hicks, senior associate director at UCI. He noted that UCI Medical Center is a “university hospital” and not a “county hospital.”

Dr. Kym Salness, emergency room department director at UCI, is conducting an informal question-and-answer session to allay staff concerns, Hicks said. Staffing levels will remain normal, he added.

“We have an unarmed public safety officer on duty in the emergency department 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” Hicks said. In addition, an armed state officer is on the premises at all times.

At Anaheim Memorial, the hospital hires 24-hour security. Recent changes include having security officers include the emergency room in their rounds, Statz said.

In addition, most hospitals have guards with radio receivers or walkie-talkies. Statz said Anaheim Memorial has also placed an additional radio in the emergency room. If there is trouble, a guard can “respond immediately,” she said.

The last incident in Orange County involving a gunman was at the state’s Fairview Developmental Center in Costa Mesa. One man died and two other staff workers were injured when a disgruntled employee went on a shooting spree in July, 1991. The shooting prompted a review of security procedures at the state hospital.