Hospital security response times are reported in almost every security dashboard, and in many hospitals the number means very little. A single average, such as “under four minutes,” can hide a dangerous reality: the emergency department is fast, the fifth floor of the tower is slow, and the worst delays happen at 3 a.m. on the one shift with the fewest officers. If a board is going to rely on a number, it has to know what the number measures.
Three Clocks, Not One
When leaders say response time, they may mean three different things. The first is the time from the moment someone calls for help to the moment an officer is told. The second is the time from the call to the moment an officer arrives at the exact location of the problem. The third is the time from the call to the point at which the situation is under control or resolved. Each answers a different question and points to a different fix.
The first clock measures the call-taking and dispatch process. A long gap there means a communications problem: a busy switchboard, a unclear number for staff to call, a duress button that goes to the wrong place, or a dispatcher doing three jobs. The second measures movement. A long gap there points to staffing, posting, geography and access. The third measures capability. A long gap there suggests that the officer arrived but lacked training, backup or authority to resolve the situation. If you track only one clock, you will fix only one kind of problem.
Why Averages Mislead
An average hides the tail. Picture a hospital that reports a three-minute average. If most calls are quick, simple ones near a security post, a handful of calls to the far end of a large building can take ten minutes and barely move the average. Yet those handful of calls may be the dangerous ones. The patient in a distant wing is not helped by an average.
Ask for the median, the slowest ten percent and the slowest single calls, not just the mean. Ask for results by call type, because a request to escort a visitor is not a violent patient. Ask for results by location, by shift and by day of the week. A leader who sees a chart showing that response times double after midnight in the parking structure has information worth acting on. A leader who sees only a monthly average does not.
Measure by Place
Hospitals are not uniform. The emergency department, the behavioral health unit, labor and delivery, the pharmacy, the parking structures, remote clinics and the loading dock all have different risk and different access. Build a simple map of your sites and record response times for each area over a few months. Where the numbers are worst, look for the cause on the ground.
The common causes are physical. Elevators that take time, are occupied by patient transport, or require a key or credential for the officer to use them. Stairwells with doors that are locked from the stairwell side. Long corridors between buildings. Secure units that require staff to open the door for the officer. Walk the route from the nearest officer post to each high-risk area, with a stopwatch, under normal conditions and with a realistic delay at the elevator. The result is usually sobering, and it is one of the cheapest assessments a leader can order.
The Emergency Department Is Not the Whole Hospital
Most hospitals concentrate officers in or near the emergency department, which makes sense given the volume of incidents. The consequence is that the response to the rest of the facility depends on pulling officers away from the ED, which may leave it exposed. Measure how often that happens. Track the time an ED post is left uncovered and the time it takes officers to return.
Also track the experience of the people calling. Nurses and clinicians know when help was slow, and they stop calling when they believe nobody will come. A drop in calls is not always a sign of improvement. Ask clinical staff directly whether they call security when they should, and if not, why. That perception is a measure of its own.
Get the Data Without Building a Project
Many hospitals already collect what they need. A computer-aided dispatch system, a call log, radio records, access control logs and incident reports all hold timestamps. If your records are on paper, begin by adding a few fields: time of call, time dispatched, time of arrival, time resolved, location and call type. Make the officer or dispatcher record those in every case. Consistency matters more than sophistication.
Check the data for honesty. If every arrival is logged at the same round number of minutes, officers are estimating. If the time of the call is entered after the fact, the clocks are off. Compare the logs with radio recordings and access control events for a sample of calls. Bad data produces comfortable numbers, and comfortable numbers are the most dangerous kind.
Set Targets That Mean Something
A target should be tied to the risk. Your most serious calls, such as an assault in progress or a weapon reported, should have the shortest target and be tracked separately. Lower-priority calls can have longer ones. Set targets for each clock and for the slowest calls as well as the typical ones. Do not borrow a number from another hospital. Different buildings, different staffing and different risks produce different realities, and there is no universal standard I would ask a leader to rely on.
Be careful not to reward speed at the expense of safety. Officers who feel pressure to arrive quickly may arrive alone in a situation that needs a team. A good measure includes whether backup was available and whether the response was appropriate to the call, not just whether it was fast.
Test It, Do Not Just Report It
Security is only assumed until it is tested. Reports of response times are assumptions until they are checked against a drill. Run unannounced, safe, planned response tests in different areas and shifts, with clinical leaders aware and the patient environment protected. Time each clock. Observe where the delay appears. Repeat after any change in staffing, posting, elevators or technology to see whether the fix worked.
Who Owns the Number
The security director should own the measurement, but the number touches others. Facilities controls the elevators and doors. Information technology owns the radios, the dispatch system and the network. Clinical leaders control the units and the way staff call for help. Executive leadership owns the resources. Put these groups in the same room each quarter, show them the data by place and shift, and assign each delay to someone who can fix it.
A response time that is defined, measured by place and shift, checked for honesty and tested in drills is worth a board’s attention. A single average, no matter how good it looks, is not.
Go Deeper
Building measures like these, and turning them into action across departments, is a core part of what a part-time security executive can do. Read What Is a Fractional Security Director? The Complete Guide for the model, and my book Fractional Security Director for the detail.
Commissioner William Epps is a former elected Fire Commissioner, federal law-enforcement supervisor, and firefighter since 2006, with instructor credentials in Hazardous Materials response, Active Shooter preparedness, and Stop the Bleed®. He spent seven years in federal law enforcement in physical security, executive protection, and incident command, and now serves organizations as a Fractional Security Director. He is the author of The Spirit of Saul, The Spirit of Pharaoh, and other practical books on security, leadership, and faith, built around one idea: knowledge should be practical enough to use when it matters.
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