Crime Analytics and Healthcare Security: Casey T. Harris on The HealthSpark

5 Key Takeaways:

• Objective crime data adds context to healthcare security planning. Location-specific crime risk intelligence can supplement internal incident data, employee observations, and other information healthcare organizations already collect.
• Internal and external risk should be considered together. Understanding both what is happening within a facility and the crime environment surrounding it can provide a more complete picture of security risk.
• Predictive risk forecasting helps organizations prioritize. Rather than predicting individual crimes, forecasting can help healthcare leaders identify facilities that may warrant greater attention or security resources.
• Crime analytics can support portfolio-wide decisions. Healthcare systems can use consistent risk intelligence to compare hospitals, clinics, urgent care centers, and other facilities across multiple locations.
• Better risk visibility supports better resource allocation. A clearer understanding of risk can help healthcare leaders determine where limited security resources and investments may have the greatest impact.

Using Crime Analytics to Strengthen Healthcare Security

Healthcare organizations face a unique security environment. Hospitals and other healthcare facilities welcome patients, employees, visitors, and vendors from across their communities, often around the clock and during highly stressful situations. Those conditions can create security challenges that vary significantly by facility and location.

In a recent episode of The HealthSpark: Igniting Healthcare Management Change with Dr.Raya, CAP Index Vice President of Crime Risk Modeling Casey T. Harris, Ph.D., joined host Dr. Ginger Raya to discuss how crime analytics and predictive risk forecasting can help healthcare leaders better understand these challenges and make more informed security decisions.

Bringing Greater Objectivity to Healthcare Security

Healthcare organizations already rely heavily on data to evaluate patient care, staffing, workflows, and operational performance. According to Harris, there is an opportunity to bring that same level of rigor to security.

Crime data, however, can be difficult to collect, standardize, and forecast. This can leave organizations relying heavily on previous incidents, perceptions, or anecdotal information when evaluating security risk.

Harris emphasized the importance of adding objective information to that decision-making process:

“Like most other strategic functions that a hospital is going to take, we want that to be objective. And not anecdotal.”

Objective crime risk intelligence can provide healthcare leaders with another perspective on their facilities, helping them evaluate risk more consistently and identify locations where greater attention may be warranted.

This becomes particularly valuable when resources are limited. Harris explains that predictive forecasting can help organizations determine which locations deserve greater attention and where security investments may have the greatest impact.

Connecting Internal and External Risk

Objective crime data does not replace what healthcare organizations already know about their facilities. Instead, it can add another layer of context.

Healthcare systems may already track incidents and critical events while gathering feedback from emergency departments, hospitalists, security personnel, and other employees. Harris describes this quantitative and qualitative information as an important starting point for understanding security.

The next step is understanding what is happening outside the facility.

CAP Index provides crime risk intelligence for the community surrounding a location, allowing healthcare organizations to consider how conditions outside a hospital or clinic may relate to what they experience inside. Those external insights can then be combined with internal information to develop a more complete picture of risk.

For healthcare systems managing hospitals, urgent care facilities, outpatient clinics, diagnostic centers, and other locations, this approach can also make it easier to compare risk across a portfolio and prioritize where additional security analysis or resources may be appropriate.

Using Data to Make More Informed Security Decisions

Predictive analytics cannot determine exactly when or where an individual crime will occur. Its value is in helping healthcare leaders better understand the risk environment surrounding their facilities and make more informed decisions about where to focus their attention.

By combining internal knowledge with objective, location-specific crime risk intelligence, healthcare organizations can build a more complete understanding of their security environment, prioritize limited resources, and approach security planning with greater confidence.

As Harris’s conversation on The HealthSpark demonstrates, better security planning starts with understanding what your organization already knows, identifying what may be missing, and bringing those different layers of information together. Listen to the full episode of The HealthSpark: Igniting Healthcare Management Change with Dr. Raya on her Podbean page or wherever you get your podcasts.

About The HealthSpark: Igniting Healthcare Management Change with Dr. Raya

The HealthSpark: Igniting Healthcare Management Change with Dr. Raya is a dynamic podcast series where we delve into the minds of trailblazing healthcare industry leaders. Hosted by Dr. Ginger Raya, a seasoned expert in healthcare management and organizational leadership, this podcast shines a light on those who are driving innovation and transformation in the healthcare sector. 

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