HID Connects S2E8: Security and Healthcare — Are We Taking Care of Those Who Are Taking Care of Us?
Welcome to HID Connects!
HID Connects is a podcast designed to bring you the latest news and trends in the security space. Our goal is to not only equip you with information and best practices, but also open new conversations on topics shaping our industry.
To wrap up this season of HID Connects, we're going to dive deep into the world of security and healthcare to discuss what can be done to enhance staff safety, patient experience, and everything in between. Healthcare is an industry that impacts all of us, directly, or indirectly. Whether we realize it or not, protecting the healthcare ecosystem is of key importance.
Joining us today are, Clete Bordeaux, Healthcare Business Development Director, Brett Lanoo, Senior Sales Manager of Healthcare within our Extended Access Technologies Unit, and Kerry Brock, Vice president of sales, healthcare RTLS. Together, we’ll answer the question, “Security in healthcare — are we taking care of those who are taking care of us?”
Take a minute to listen below. And while you’re at it, be sure to subscribe to receive future episodes.
Here is a transcript if you’d like to read along:
Matt Winn
Hello, everyone. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Whatever time it is and wherever in the world you may be. My name is Matt Winn, your podcast host and resident secure identities nerd.
Welcome to the season two finale of HID Connects. To wrap up this season, we're going to dive deep into the world of healthcare security to discuss what can be done to enhance staff safety, enhance patient experience and everything in between. You know, whether we like it or not, health care impacts all of us, either directly or indirectly. So, protecting everyone and everything and that ecosystem is really of key importance.
To help us learn more about the world of healthcare security, I'm excited to be joined in the studio by two expert guests. First, we have Clete Bordeaux, Healthcare Business Development Director, also joining us in the studio is Brett Lanoo, Senior Sales Manager of Healthcare within our Extended Access Technologies Unit.
And, last but not least, joining us virtually for her second HID connects appearance is Kerry Brock, VP of Sales for Healthcare RTLS. So, let's start with those introductions and get to know our guests a little bit better. Clete, we'll go with you to start. Thanks so much for joining us. First and foremost, just mind saying hello and tell us a little bit about what you do at HID, please.
Clete Bordeaux
Specifically at HID, I am director of Healthcare, Business Development on the Identity and Access Management side. Title aside, title of even the company aside, it is probably the most rewarding things I have ever done, to participate in this space. It's super relatable. Like you said, we all have hospital experience in one way, shape or form, fortunate or unfortunate. So, it is the most rewarding space I've had a chance to work in.
Matt Winn
Very cool. Thank you for joining us. Okay. And over to you, Brett. Welcome to the podcast, tell us about yourself and what you do around here.
Brett Lanoo
It's a pleasure to be here. A first-time podcaster. So, collectively been here going on sixteen years now, at HID. Fortunately enough, we were acquired. My background is in more biometric centric technologies under the Extended Access Technologies team. We are responsible for the enablement of the authentication technologies, both finished readers and modules for third party solutions, enabling basically the ecosystem for secure access throughout healthcare. And I'm happy to be here and looking forward to this year.
Matt Winn
Absolutely happy to have you. And of course, Kerry, welcome back to the podcast. How have you been? And can you remind our listeners who you are and tell them a little bit more about what you do here?
Kerry Brock
Well, thanks for having me back. Yep. My name is Kerry Brock and I’m responsible for the healthcare RTLS for real time, location services and part of our business part of IDT. And I look after the sales and strategy for our business unit, and I, like Clete, really enjoy working with hospitals and health care. And they're part of our lives and whether they’re customers or personally, extremely important to the ecosystem. As you mentioned. So I'm excited to talk about things today.
Matt Winn
Excellent. And that is a perfect segue way for us to kick off this episode. So, everyone, now that you know who our guests are, let's get started. The burning question for today's episode is, “Security in healthcare, are we taking care of those who are taking care of us?” All right. First question, and that is more of a lay of the land question for those who may not be in the healthcare space or for those who are more general in the security industry, or even for someone like my mom who is listening to the podcast for maybe the third time. Explain this and Clete, we'll start with you. What are some of the challenges in security that are specific to health care that you think it's important for listeners to know about?
Clete Bordeaux
It's funny, because I use my mom when talking about this topic also and I say, what my mom will and won't do. In thinking about when my mom was coming in the hospital decades ago, research showed that key to patient care was supportive loved ones. So, everybody comes… Mom, cousin, Dad, everybody comes in. That's not where we are anymore. That's not what the workplace violence results show us. And so that's where things are taking a left when it comes to healthcare security. I'm excited that we are aware of that and that we are making changes. By no means are we there yet, but we are turning the bus slowly so that's a big difference when we talk about healthcare security.
Matt Winn
Very nice, Brett. What do you think is specific to healthcare that we should know about?
Brett Lanoo
Yeah, from my perspective and experience around the authentication side of things, it is personal. Definitely personal comes down to the caregivers being able to have secure access to deliver that quality of service that we all would like to strive for. Right? Unfortunately, it's not all perfect. Under HID whats nice about is we have the ability to impact the whole ecosystem.
Under HID we have secured credentials, providing secure access, knowing who's giving you that care as well as who you're giving it to. Identifying both the physician and the patient are critical and being able to go ahead and do that confidently and reliably under HID and the extent Access Technology team, we have the ability to really go ahead and build out this ecosystem and take the clinician on a journey and ultimately end up with a quality service.
And that is a healthy outcome for the patient. And I think access to critical care or data is part of that. But we do identify and protect the front end of that process, which is a very valuable piece in the whole equation of the healthcare continuum.
Matt Winn
Very good. Kerry, same question to you. What's unique to healthcare? What challenges do they face that you may not see elsewhere?
Kerry Brock
I'm going to build a little bit on what my colleagues just said. But, when I thought about this, I thought about it in two different aspects. One of the biggest concerns is that healthcare is still the most dangerous profession in the U.S. and in many countries due to workplace violence and there are so many issues and challenges around that that I think impact that. I look at that because I sell stuff, safety systems. I think about that, but I also think about hospitals and how challenging it is to protect those facilities for the very reason you're talking about, people coming in and their an open-door policy, unlike other commercial facilities, which I might have to show my passport to get into, I might have to go through a security check, I might have to go through a metal detector, there can be a whole, many, many layers. My photo will be taken. But a lot of times in hospitals, I just sail right through the door. Doors are open 24/7. Sometimes there's not even a guard or a security person there, he is wandering around the facility. So, that's concerning. And we can help there with, you know, ID badges and things and access control systems.
And I think the second thing is, that people that are coming through these facilities, these are high-volume facilities, 24/7. There is a huge number of people. And these people are coming in in various states. But, first of all, most people are very stressed when they walk into a hospital. So, they are either there because they are ill, there because they have an injury, there because they have a medical condition or mental illness, or they're going to visit somebody that's in peril. Most of us aren't on our A-game when we're in a hospital, right? So there's people that, you know, they walk into a hospital and feel an instant panic feeling going into those places. And those levels of stress impact people's behavior and people's behavior being modified causes security risks. So, I look at it from different multiple angles of who are those individuals? All those stakeholders are in there. And then you've got the people that are trying to care for these people walking through the door.
And then there's the other security risks that hospitals have with cybersecurity, with data sensitivity, interoperability between technology systems, aging infrastructure. So, there's a huge amount of mounting challenges for healthcare I would say today.
Matt Winn
Seems like a pretty complex environment. And speaking of my mom, she's a nurse practitioner in emergency rooms in rural West Texas. She always says, I never see people on their best day. I normally see them on the worst days in between emotions and everything that's involved. There's a lot to it. But Kerry, that's an excellent segue into more of what the security approach for healthcare is, right? And we talk about — whether it's higher ed or other facilities, including healthcare — layered security matters. So, Clete, I'll start with you. What does a layered security approach mean and what does this look like in a healthcare or hospital environment? What can you speak to as it relates to layered security?
Clete Bordeaux
Layered security, in my space, typically is going to be on the physical side of things. And it's something I hear them say all the time, like a multi-pronged approach. And we'll just think about an ER ED like where your mom is, the ones that get it and the ones that are making the appropriate moves. Just as an example, as soon as I come into your mom's facility, I would have gone through some type of weapons detection and then following that, because I am bound to be sitting, I’m just going to keep saying your mom's facility, sitting in your mom's facility for hours on end, they would want to send me to some form of badging, some type of visitor management. Who am I? And I'm going to be sitting here potentially for hours. So, the ones that get it, just as a simple example of a multi-prong approach is weapons detection, when you come into the ED, your badge. I'm from Chicago, so it was -20 a couple of days ago, who's going to want to come in there? Transients, people that are seeking warmth, that are not actually seeking care. We need to be able to run them through databases, etc. So, that's a super simple example from a physical standpoint, a multi-pronged approach to healthcare security that we're just starting to head towards. We're just starting to think about weapons detection in a hospital.
Nobody thought about that a few years ago, and you'd be amazed at some of the statistics that some of my security director colleagues, again, just on a weapons detection front, just giving you an example of how this may not be the place you think it is. We had one do a pilot program and he pulled 40,000 pieces of contraband just from the ED. So again, think about who's in the ED, who's working there. Our loved ones, 40,000 pieces of contraband in one year. You know, who are the people, what databases can we run them against when they're walking the halls, can we can we identify them, etc. So, super simple example of multi-pronged approach.
Matt Winn
Simple but powerful example on that one. Thank you for sharing that. Brett, from your lens.
Brett Lanoo
Yeah, from my lens. I'm looking at it as, you know, typically for the access and on the logical access side, right, coming at it, everything is kind of downstream from the physical access piece. What's nice about it, we're seeing a lot more automated or contactless technologies that are being implemented on the front door, physical access cameras, things like that that can identify an actual person or a positive ID, right? Contain that person if they're, you know, almost like, an allow/disallow list where they can't get through that first door. But once they're in, they're authorized or they're an approved visitor coming to visit somebody on the floor and then at that moment in time, you have open access to your systems, records, other resources, wireless cards, things like that. And so, from a layered approach, my standpoint is I look at the infinite amount of wireless cards that are sitting around, you know, nursing stations share desktops. These things are an open door. And typically going back 15 years ago, personal experience was, you know, my son born in the room, the password was Citrix1 to access.
Clete Bordeaux
For everyone?
Brett Lanoo
For everyone. Everyone there was there was a shared station. And their idea of a shared station was a shared password. So fast forward. My daughter was born two years later, 13 years ago. They implemented a tap and go solution that provided that, in addition to a password. It's a step forward but ultimately, you know, they moved to fingerprint biometrics where they could actually go and streamline it, get rid of the password, even go ahead and still leverage the credential prox, whatever it was going to be to do a multi-factor, two-tiered approach to getting in that station. I felt much better about it. But that's only one example of all these stations that are all vulnerable to anybody who is potentially unidentified at the front door that can get in and then gain access through a physical station.
Clete Bordeaux
Quick one for you, Brett. Just because I follow healthcare security in the news very intently, what I see a lot of, and I'm wondering can you help with this, unfortunately, several healthcare networks with ransomware. Are you, could you weigh in on that at all? Does your product lend towards stopping some of that?
Brett Lanoo
So, hardening the endpoints is the number one thing we do under the external access group, right? Whether it's card readers, biometric readers, our best strength is securing the front door. Protecting access to that identity assurance is the key cornerstone to everything you're doing from an auditing standpoint, compliance, regulatory standpoint. We provide those two things up front, and then we're reliant upon a back-end system to actually go ahead and help detect and monitor and remediate things that happen. Something has to respond to that. Alerts, flags. Somebody is physically going to have to get involved in it at some point. But with COVID, mass migration, right? Remote healthcare, telehealth. Biggest thing was there, “how quickly can you set up VDI and how quickly can you secure it?” Fingerprint biometrics is one of the obvious choices because a thin client with a fingerprint reader interoperability was key.
We're already built into all the HR Platforms. Fortunately, HID has been doing this for a long 17 years, 20 years now in some areas. So, we're pretty well built out where our technologies can be adapted quickly and scaled. Not everyone is that fortunate. You know, they don't have the funds that are on the budget resources, but with the health information exchange pushing things now top down, not all boats rise at the same rate, right? So, you got community hospitals out there in rural America. Large health systems that do have the resources in the US today. But there's a long way to go before you have a standard out there where everybody's at the same level from from a multi-factor authentication or security standpoint.
Matt Winn
And Kerry, I see you nodding. So anything you want to tack on…
Kerry Brock
I want to build on one thing that Brett was mentioning about security and making physical access secure and Clete as well. It's security to prevent people from actually being able to get into an area that they shouldn't be able to get into and having some kind of ID. In Iowa I think was 2022, there was a man who got into the NICUs or the neonatal intensive care unit and fed somebody's baby. And he went in there impersonating a father. But that unit obviously did not have either access control and did not have a way to validate who he was. Now, in this case, was the baby harmed? No, but that's a horrific incident for those parents and really unacceptable because what if he had meant to harm them? The conclusion of this case is that he meant the baby no harm. Well, that's a bit of a stretch for me. And so that's a perfect example in my mind of where security fell down there and a second thing I think about is we hear from nurses all the time about the staff safety staff dress systems that we sell. And when we ask them, like, how often do you use this? And the nurse said, “Well, we probably use it once a month.” And that doesn't sound like a lot, except if every nurse presses that button every month, that's a lot of incidences because hospitals could have hundreds and hundreds of nurses. And so, you think about how much violence they're exposed to and how many times. The problem is, a lot of it is, like 90-95% it's the patient. They're already in the facility. So, we have to think about these security systems from one, it's like, sure, let's try to keep out the people that shouldn’t be there. The problem is we also got people in and those people are in for however long they need to be in to get the care.
Clete Bordeaux
That's patient generated violence, that's the term they use, patient generated violence.
Kerry Brock
That's right. And it's the majority. And then it's followed by family members of the patient. And then and then third is just a complete random stranger who walks in and decides to perpetrate a violent act. So, it's both. It's in, it's inside and outside, right? There’s perimeter protection. There's unit protection. And then there's, you know, what do we do beyond that?
Brett Lanoo
I was going to add to that, it's interesting, you mentioned the whole thing about the initial identification of the user and kind of restricting access, if you will, some of the technologies that HID is bringing to market right now, including our proprietary camera and some of the Fusion, the AI and modules behind that, some of the leading use cases right now are going to be around not only the patient intake centers and that contactless experience on identifying you positively who you are. Queue up your next session. This is your appointment. They're extending that to NICUs. So, it's a unique use case where I can go ahead and literally walk in when you have an allow/disallow list. And if you're not allowed in there, you're going to be blocked from entry. So obviously parents, registered users, things who are vetted or people are vetted are going to be allowed and which is a good thing. So, is it perfect? Probably not. But guess what? It's a step in the right direction based on the experiences, you know, that you've had and then use cases are mentioned in there.
Matt Winn
And Clete, on the staff safety. What else would you have to offer or Kerry you jump in as well?
Kerry Brock
Well, I was going to just build on that while we're on infant security, we've been doing infant security systems for close to 20 years. And while there isn't an incredibly high number of infant abductions, they happen every year. And of those, you know, there's maybe since they've been tracking them in hospitals, there's still, you know, somewhere around 15 or 16 babies that never were recovered.
And what a tragedy that is in the hospitals. This is preventable by using an infant security protection system and tagging the babies while they're in hospital. And then if you compound that with what Brett's saying about identifying every parent and recording that, like our system allows you to put information about the parent, the parents, the caregivers, guardians, family members, if there's a do not allow access list in there.
So, we can you know, where we think there's a high risk around a particular infant could be due to a custody case, could be due to one of the parents having mental illness, it could be somebody who's not been granted access to that to that child. Yes. So, there are ways to make huge differences in combining. I don't think there's one, you know, magic system.
I think it's a combination and layering these on one on top of the other. And there's multiple ways to do it. But more has to be done because there's also a lot of mix ups. You know, babies are given to the wrong parent by accident. And because we're not identifying the right baby and the right parent and we're not taking that extra care. And so, there's many things that can be done, I think, to improve it.
Clete Bordeaux
You were talking about change and change in this space. What it looks like. And I think another important part of the change is to start to see legislation. And so, listening to some of your conversation, Kerry makes me think about, like Calley's Law and some of these other things that are trying to protect the most vulnerable, which …
Matt Winn
Tell us more about that law.
Clete Bordeaux
… it has to do, it's state based. So, it's not federal, more things are going federal and protecting healthcare, just like how we protect flight attendants as an example. And that's a great thing. Lots of people are pushing for that to be federal. But even at the state level, several states, I think Texas included, does things to specifically help protect health care workers.
But in a specific instance, Calley's law is about restraining orders and protecting those that should be protected by strict restraining orders. So, we were talking to a California children's hospital. And to Kerry's point, mom is not always welcome. The child may actually be guarded by someone else. So that needs to be protected. Actually, I may not even be allowed to divulge to mom where the child is. These are the kinds of things that even at the legislation level, state or federal, tools like what HID offers can help to protect the most vulnerable.
Matt Winn
Right. Anything you want to add?
Brett Lanoo
Know just from the authentication or the ID standpoint, I just see a lot more layers at this point right now where we have the future kind of trends where we're going. If we could have like a digital identity right at birth. You know, Kerry, you know.
Clete Bordeaux
Sounds like a movie.
Brett Lanoo
Exactly. Doesn't it? Isn't that great? But I always think about and I envision this whole digital identity in the in the whole initial engagement with the person. How do you tag somebody with that? You know, and then how can it follow their journey through the healthcare system? The whole health or healthcare continuum doesn't matter whether it's the dining hall or a vending machine, you know, whether you're a faculty, staff, visitor, whatever you're going to be. And it's just unique to see where these technologies are being laid out today by HID and they're converging. And we're really at the center of it right now in healthcare, where all these things literally are being realized going from a person at the front door, an employee from the parking garage, as we talked about earlier, to the front desk, to your desktop, to your literally exam room floating from exam room A to Z, follow me sessions with VDI. It's just incredible how HID is participating in this today. And a lot of it is, you know, under the extended access group, it’s kind of like we’re best kept secret, right? A lot of times I relate to BASF. If you guys remember the old tagline with them, you may not be familiar with us, but you know, we make a lot of the products you buy better. I really, truly believe that HID is similar to that in the nature that we make the things that you've purchased more secure or what you're designing into, this is more secure, and we're part of that. Whether it's a digital identity on a card, a fob, a wristband, a biometric ID, it's going and it's accelerating quickly. And this is the year I think we're going to see a lot of change and into the next 23-24, you can see a lot of stuff actually implemented.
Clete Bordeaux
I tell people that all the time. They say, you know, where do you work and say HID? And they say, “what?” And I say, I guarantee, you know, HID, you just didn't you knew HID. And so, we start talking about things they've seen on a wall, something on their badge.
Brett Lanoo
Yeah. Flip the card over.
Clete Bordeaux
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Great point.
Matt Winn
Kerry, I'm going to ask you the hard question because you're our veteran on the podcast with all of these technology solutions and options and knowing that hospitals and healthcare facilities have a finite budget, where does the impetus lie? Where do you start and how do you prioritize, and what recommendations and advice would you give to healthcare facilities and those who are looking to protect them? Where do you start and how do you get started?
Kerry Brock
Well, that's a big question. I'll unpack a few in there. But I think it's, one is establishing a team of internal stakeholders who are going to be on this the team to look over what is already in place. So, one is evaluating what the current technology is. Two, is evaluating what the biggest issues are and making sure that you get some consensus among the stakeholders.
And then of course, budget is going to come into this. You may have to do these things. I don't think any hospital is going to start up multiple systems at once. It's just too much impact on the IT and then the project managers, but they may want to look at a, you know, a staged rollout where they start to look at technology, first of all, making sure that the technology is interoperable.
Is your access control system going to work with your video management system? Is your video management system and your access control going to work with your articles? Is it going to be compliant with your cyber security? Do you have enough capacity on your network, etc.? I think it's a you know, there's a checklist there.
And if you're talking about multi-site hospitals, I think it's even more important for them as we're seeing consolidation in the healthcare space where hospitals are buying up other groups of hospitals and becoming a bigger enterprise and I think when they're doing that, they have to look across multiple facilities and really have, that is a tough job for the CIO or the CTO who's looking at what is the strategy for the next step. You know, they might have something that's emergent that they absolutely have to address because a system is end of life or it's failing or they have a brand new security risk that will probably get budget and get quickly rushed. But I think longer term, there's like, what's your mid-term and future strategy about where are you going to take this facility?
And a lot of these hospitals, their campuses, they're not just a building, they are complex facilities. I was talking to a hospital in Michigan. She said, “Well, we're about a mile long when you stretch it out across all the buildings.” Well, that's a heck of a difference. If somebody with just so I have a five-story office building or something, these are completely different. You have multiple applications in there. So, it takes research and it takes you know, you really need somebody to champion it. If I look at Mayo Clinic, who's a customer of ours, they've done a phenomenal job, but they have a true leader of RTLS solutions and they are really thinking strategically. You can read the white paper on that, but they've done an amazing job of really thinking about this across their patient population, across multiple facilities and across their own employees and staff and what do they need to do and in conjunction with the IT folks.
So I think if you take that, you actually have a strategy that makes a difference. You can't just hope this will all come together. Because I always tell people hope is not a strategy. You know, I hope it'll be okay. I hope it'll come together. It just won't. So it needs to be intentional heading into.
Clete Bordeaux
I was going to add into that, something that Kerry said made me think, you know, what puts this to the front of the list? And, you know, when you talk about mergers and acquisitions, of course. But another thing that we get a chance to see and again, Kerry and I are more on the physical side of things, but new hospital builds, renovations. These are chances for them to look at best-in-class solutions. Excellent. You know, things like that. So, the budgeting is there, the planning is there, the entire team and steering committee is there. So, when we're talking about revamping bid due to acquisition or again, renovation, building a brand new billion dollar building like hospitals like to do, that's a great time for to determine what bubbles to the top of their list. That's a great time for it to do so.
Matt Winn
Very good. Brett, what advice and suggestions do you have for those who are looking to start at some point?
Brett Lanoo
Yeah, you know, one of the challenges in the past was these things were all just separate. You had a firewall between IT security and the user community and today it's a committee and they all have a vested interest in it.
Clete Bordeaux
You know, everything's a committee.
Brett Lanoo
Everything's coming in now, right? And so what's nice about it is kind of when I look at the physical access and the authentication piece or logical side, I see this converged access initiative and that's the biggest trend that I'm seeing in healthcare across the university space, you know, other regulated industries. But converged access is key to where I see the physical access folks working with the actual logical access folks and making a unified decision that is going to go ahead and be scalable across our whole organization.
And they're sharing the investment. It's leveraged and they're future proofing their environments. They're investing in technology that they may not use, such as mobile access or virtual credentials or something like that at some point. But they're investing in that now today because they realize do it now means they're good for the next 20 to 30 years.
And believe it or not, the digital identity is going to be around that long. It's just going to be a different, you know, a different vehicle or a different presenting, a different form of fashion. So, but it's here to stay. And by establishing that now they can go ahead and focus on quality of care and other areas that are going to be more of a priority to that organization as they grow.
Matt Winn
Very good. And that's a good segue into kind of an off-topic question. But, you know, the next 20 or 30 years, what do you see is coming in the future? Like what technology trends are exciting to you? What would be different if we were to have, you know, season 32 of this podcast, what's coming. So, Brett, we'll stick with you. What excites you the most about what's on the horizon from a technology perspective?
Brett Lanoo
Well, kind of, kind of the you're born with a digital identity, right? Maybe it'll be a chromosome or something like that. It's unique to you and only you. And no matter where you go, and we're going to have these different, you know, abilities to capture and track that person good and bad. You know, privacy is going to be a big concern no matter what.
You know, legislation, things like that are going to come into play. But maybe a little short term, I think facial recognition, biometrics, things that are able to go ahead and identify people and allow them to just freely roam securely and safely, you know, throughout their daily routine or work routine, whatever it's going to be. And I'm looking forward to the next couple of years.
As I mentioned earlier on, some of the initiatives we have underway right now, it is going to be contactless journey. It's going to be automated, people are going to be provisioned and be granted access and enforced access or whatever are going to be restricted access on a case-by-case situation. And I think it's going to make the world a lot safer. You know, we're doing our little part every, you know, customer time.
Matt Winn
Kerry, what's exciting to you on the tech horizon in the health care space.
Kerry Brock
Well, what did you say 20 to 30 years I guess hopefully my retirement, but beyond, that I would agree that some kind of digital, you know chip type identifier will probably be standard. We've been doing it for pets so I guess we'll have to switch to people. But I think facial recognition could be a game changer for healthcare.
They're using it successfully. Obviously, they started noticing they were using at borders. And, you know, for law enforcement and, you know, espionage and other things. But it really has you know, they've been demonstrating it successfully, like in shopping malls and other areas where you have high traffic, low ability to control who comes through your doors, airports. So, I think why not hospitals?
Why couldn't they adopt some of these security technologies that would make us safer? You know, if you had a standardized system requiring everybody that comes through to have proper government issued ID, you know, unless you're in an ambulance and, that's a different scenario. But if you've walked in, you know, authenticating prior to appointments, you know, we have a wayfinding technology giving you indoor essentially indoor GPS which can connect to your electronic health records, remind you of appointments, get you to your car, tell you where how to get you back to your car.
Why couldn't we be leveling up that security with some kind of authentication? There was some kind of token with some kind of badge or ID, so I think there's lots that that can be done and I think that part is super exciting. And, you know, I think it's just about how to get started. And I think that's probably overwhelming, even though it's gone from an individual decision to a committee decision, I still think there's a lot out there.
And so, if we can help focus and simplify some of these decisions, if hospitals can choose companies like HID where they have multiple technologies under one umbrella, that's going to be much better than managing multiple brands and multiple vendors and trying to get a cohesive solution. So, I like the direction we're going.
Matt Winn
Very good. Very good. Clete, what's exciting to you? What do you see in the future?
Clete Bordeaux
So, my answer is not going to be anywhere near as sexy. It's not so much about the next widget for me. Your mom is in healthcare, my fiancée is in healthcare. My daughter is going to be a physician's assistant, so she's going to be in healthcare. I am excited about adoption. You know, so there are you know, Kerry mentioned there's hospitals out there with best-in-class solutions that are following around patients’ devices.
I have hospitals with laser-etched optical barrier turnstiles, secure elevators for the NICU, so there's all kinds of cool things we can do right now. But should my fiancée be attacked again, she does not have a button to press for someone to help her, should something happen to your mom, etc. There's way too many people that have nothing, so I am excited for adoption via local legislation via someone recognizes the ROI on maintaining the bright people that they work with because they did not jump ship due to safety. I am excited for adoption in any way, shape or form because we are really just getting started on these things. Coming into healthcare, we're really just getting started. Curiously, do you know if your mom's facility has visitor management? Does your mom have a duress button?
Matt Winn
Not to my knowledge.
Clete Bordeaux
Super simple, right? It's super simple. Kerry said something that.
Kerry Brock
You can call me, I can help you, it is super simple. If there was one system in a hospital that is so easy to do to deploy a staff safety system is one of those.
Clete Bordeaux
Yeah. And she said something a second ago that I want to go back to. I want to make sure we catch how important that is. She said, you know, they may only press it once a month. I have never felt threatened at work and I was a marine. Have you ever felt threatened at work?
Kerry Brock
That's probably why. No, I said I don't expect you marines to be afraid.
Clete Bordeaux
But I'm just thinking, I don't wish that for my daughter. I don't wish that for your mom, for my fiancée, for anyone. Once a month, press a button. But that is where they are. That stats show us that is the environment they're working in. Workplace violence has exceeded law enforcement as a violent profession. So even pressing once a month, I think that is…
Kerry Brock
Conservative number too. That's super conservative.
Clete Bordeaux
That is super scary for someone, anyone with loved ones or even without loved ones there. You know, remember the big push during COVID like, you know, protect those that are helping us, like, we should all be much, much more compassionate for what they're doing and first responders period for what they're doing in healthcare. We should all be much, much more compassionate. And I just I'm excited that we can all start to head that way and start to understand let's protect those. You know.
Matt Winn
And you may have answered the burning question for today, but I'll start with you to wrap things up. So 30 seconds or less, burning question, security and health care, are we taking care of those who are taking care of us?
Clete Bordeaux
Perfect segue way, right? And we're beginning to we have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of work to do. Again, super simple example, and I'm sure Kerry knows a whole lot of people that are not protected. My loved ones are not protected. Your loved one is not protected in the simple ways that they could be.
So, I will acknowledge we are not where we were six years ago when I started in this space, 2018. So we're not there, but we were headed in the right direction. That's my two cents on it. We are headed in the right direction.
Matt Winn
That's positive. Brett?
Brett Lanoo
Yeah I have to say, mine pale in comparison to somebody being, you know, physically abused or attacked. It's, you know, humbling when you think about what they're doing and what they have to go through on a daily basis. Very, very, you know, on our side, we're fortunate to be able to have to be able to support companies and customers that actually go ahead and protect data information, access to resources, right? And from my standpoint, providing safety is two pronged. You've got the company itself to streamline clinician workflows, provide quick access while not impeding their quality of service is critical. It's a no brainer. They started pushing this in the mid, you know, 2009/10 and did not see it standardized across the board was unfortunate. But the other side of that is caregivers also, you have to make sure that they adopt and follow cybersecurity best practices if your company is telling you to do something, it's for a reason. So protecting yourself kind of against yourself, so to speak. But at the end of the day, you got to follow the guidelines and play by the rules.
Matt Winn
One hundred percent. Kerry. As the veteran, you get the last round of season two. So, are we taking care of those, taking care of us? What's your take?
Kerry Brock
I don't think so yet. I think there's there's two parts to this. One, you know, your 12 times more likely to experience violence in health care than any other industry. And I think sometimes for men, it might be difficult to think about that. You might not feel very vulnerable most of your life, which is, you know, it's just is just a fact. But in healthcare, 90% of nursing is women. And so, these people are at a disadvantage and they're so valuable to us. And it's the same for, you know, flight attendants. It's the same for teachers, it's the same for women in most places have more risks than men do. But in healthcare, it's just so glaring that we have to do more. And yes, regulations good. And we also do hotel safety systems because the people cleaning your room tend to be women, too and they're vulnerable and their systems that there's legislation coming them. We just made it a crime in Canada to assault health care workers. It's a federal offense now, which is great. I know the US is following legislation that's great.
I would tell hospitals, you know, if we thought about it, if we were in their shoes, what would you want at your disposal, right? What would you want to take calls for help if you were a nurse and you were in their shoes. This is a tough job. And they do 12-hour shifts and they're just so giving that we got to do more.
And then the last thing I would say is hospitals. If you don't have a budget to do the whole facility, pick a unit or two that are highest risk with the most incidents and protect those people. And it is a scalable system. So, start there, start small and do what you can do because everything will go towards building that bigger, safer, smarter hospital of the future.
Matt Winn
Very well said and as we've talked about multiple times on multiple episodes, you know, we're proud to provide great technology, but that technology is built to protect people. It's the data that follows them or whether it's themselves or those who are interacting with them. So, that's really key here. So, thank you all for sharing that.
Great way to end season two, everyone. Thank you for your insights. Clete, Brett, Kerry, thank you so much for sharing your expertise and perspective on this topic. It's a personal one. It's a humbling one. But, you know, with power that is combined I think that we can get to a better place. Thank you all. It's been truly a pleasure to have you today.
Clete Bordeaux
Thank you for having this.
Matt Winn
100%. And with that, of course, listeners an even bigger, thanks to you for joining us for this episode and for this season. We really do enjoy creating this podcast, or at least I do, and hope that you equally enjoy listening.
And guess what, everybody? I have made the executive decision that even though I'm not an executive, we are officially renewed for season three.
Thank you. Thank you. I congratulate me for that. No, I'm joking. I'm joking. There's a big team that does this and we're excited to continue moving forward. So, on that note, to be the first to know when new episodes are published, make sure that you subscribe to HID Connects. Doing so will ensure that you stay connected to us.
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Friends until season three, thanks again for listening. May your identities forever be secure.