Are you or your loved one in need of in-patient healthcare? Sadly, sometimes, we cannot take care of ourselves and our loved ones ourselves due to the extent of our medical needs. We must find a healthcare facility so you can stay healthy and comfortable. Are you unsure how to choose a suitable healthcare facility for you or your loved one? Keep reading as we discuss the top factors to consider when choosing healthcare facilities, ensuring your facility is secure, safe, and provides excellent care.
Proper Access Control And Visitor Management
When it comes to any healthcare facility, you need to know that you or your loved one will be secure. When we are undergoing medical treatment, we are highly vulnerable. You need to know that only authorized individuals can access the facility so that you or your loved one will not fall victim to a crime during your treatment.
To choose a secure facility, you should look for proper access control and visitor management systems.
Access control system door locks keep healthcare facilities secure by preventing lockpicking and ensuring that only authorized individuals with keycards, fobs, or mobile credentials can enter the building. Since there are many medications and valuable medical equipment in healthcare facilities, they are particularly exposed to security threats. The healthcare facility should provide extra security for rooms containing sensitive equipment and medications, and there should be secured to prevent building users from entering your or your loved one’s room during your residency.
Although it’s crucial to prevent intruders from entering the building, it’s also essential to ensure that visitors have an easy way to enter the property should they need to. If the medical facility opts for a mobile-enabled visitor management system, this will allow them to implement visitor management software.
Visitor management software integrates with building access control to provide all building visitors with digital forms to fill out when they need to access the building. Once they complete the registration form, the visitor can enter the building using access credentials downloaded to their mobile device. These credentials are only temporary, and the system will revoke them once they sign out.
With this system in place, the facility can keep an accurate log of visitors and their entry and exit times for security processes. Visitor management system automation is much preferred to manual logbook styles of visitor management, as they can be highly unreliable, particularly when building evacuation procedures.
Transparency
When choosing a healthcare facility for yourself or your loved one, you must know what to expect. The facility should be highly transparent about its health and safety policies, daily schedules, and care protocols. It is a red flag if the facility does not provide information regarding their care.
You should enquire about their doctorate certifications, along with their daily meal offerings and daily care routines. You should only use this healthcare facility if this information is provided upon request.
Location And Size
When considering suitability, you should consider the location of the facility. Is it close to where your friends and family live? Will they be able to visit easily and often? When one is in a medical facility, it can be an isolating experience without regular visitors. Making visitation easy will ensure visitors can come and go as they please without worrying about the commute.
Additionally, the size of the facility can have an important influence on the level of care provided. If a large facility does not have a large staff, this could indicate a low quality of care, as attendants will likely be inundated with patient care requests. So, it’s best to opt for a facility where the size equals the amount of staff.
Violation History And Reputation History
It’s essential to read up on residential medical facilities. You should browse local newspapers and resources to read up on violations and the reputation history of the medical center. You can also look at reviews of the healthcare facility to see what most residents have stated about the level of care. Reviews can often be the best indicator of quality.
Outdoor Space
If you or your loved one will be spending a lot of time at the facility, you need to know that you’ll be able to access outdoor time. Spending too much time indoors can cause vitamin D deficiency and negatively impact mental and physical health. Look for a facility with a secure outdoor space that allows patients and residents to spend time in the fresh air during their stay.
Summary
Admitting oneself or one’s family to a healthcare facility can be challenging. However, by keeping these considerations in mind, you can ensure that the healthcare facility is secure and offers a high standard of care for patients and residents. When choosing a service or care facility, you can never have too much information, and it’s essential to know any red flags to look out for.
Maria Khatun Mona is a Founder and Editor of Nursing Exercise Blog. She is a Nursing and Midwifery Expert. Currently she is working as a Registered Nurse at Evercare Hospital, Dhaka, Bangladesh. She has great passion in writing different articles on Nursing and Midwifery. Mail her at “[email protected]”
Thanks for sharing.
As a mom of a kid with asthma, it’s important for me to choose a medical center that’s near us and also reputable for doing excellent work. Thank you for stating that the facility should be extremely honest about its health and safety regulations, daily schedules, and care protocols and that it should raise concerns if it does not. I will be looking for this quality once I start to look for a medical center my kid can go to for check-ups.