NU12 - Tighter hospital security measures by Rhea Jardin

               With the recent news about a newborn baby that was kidnapped from the hospital by a false doctor, I believe that it's about time that hospitals adopt a new security measure or facility for the benefit of both the patient and the institution itself.

                Each hospital should place an identification scanner in each ward and private room where only nurses, doctors and authorized hospital staff are given access to these rooms by the use of the barcode in their respective ID cards. Each patient however will also be given one access card for their companion's use but will be recalled and deactivated once the patient is discharged from the hospital. All usage of access card by patients and hospital personnel will be recorded in the hospital's computer system in order to track down the activity of each person which will be very useful in cases where investigations are to be conducted, like for instance the recent baby-napping from a local hospital.

Furthermore, the hospital should innovate their patient tag by changing it to a metal bracelet type with a homing detector device. The hospital would then place a scanner in all of its entrance and exit doors. This patient tag will alarm if the patient passes through all these doors in cases where the patient is not yet authorized by the hospital to leave the premises. This way abduction or kidnapping of babies would be prevented as well as patients who would sneak out of the hospital without settling their obligations first.4