Page 18 - Campus Security & Life Safety, July/August 2019

healthcare security
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campuslifesecurity.com | JULY/AUGUST 2019
Control Room Considerations for the Campus Environment
The design of a modern healthcare facility/hospital or educational campus must take a number of factors into consideration: parking, traffic patterns, the ability for certain areas to be easily accessible to the public, acces- sibility of rooms, protection of critical assets and peo- ple, and much, much more. On top of all of these elements, one over- arching, critical characteristic is each building’s overall safety and security, as well as the technology implemented to keep patients, students, visitors, and staff safe.
Whether it’s called a command center, dispatch control, security monitoring room or security operations center (SOC), each campus needs a dedicated space where security officials and dispatchers can convene in an effort to effectively respond to incidents as they arise. The goal of any of these rooms is to monitor, assess, and respond to a variety of threats and incidents, but there are a number of consider- ations to keep in mind in crafting this environment.
Video Wall Clarity
When it comes to building an SOC, there’s a reason why large-scale overview video walls that showcase a number of incoming data points are dominant. Uniform and integrated visual elements are imperative to the success of an SOC or control room in a campus environment, as dispatchers and first responders require the most up-to-date and complete information regarding incoming security- related events.
These video walls offer a viewable area for a wide variety of devices and data within a single pane-of-glass view, with the heart of this mission the monitors and displays that project relevant and critical information using strategically placed video wall technology. While the size of these displays can vary significantly, they can also be com- mercial grade, taking into account lighting conditions, location, con- tent, and hours of operation.