What type of security do you have in your psych facility???

[ecipsoh]

I am a new grad nurse. I found a RN position working with in a psychiatric facility for troubled adolescents. I am curious as to how other facilities are operated. This one has residential counselors who ideally work 5 children to one counselor, but it ends up being considerably more than that since the facility has a large turn over of workers. When there is a crisis on one of the units it is the residential counselor, usually female and a nurse who are responsible for maintaining the crisis. This means restraining if need be. The kids run in age from 7 to 21 and some are quite large and violent. Last week three codes were called on three separate units simultaneously, so there was no backup counselors to help restrain the fighting adolescents. The older adolescents broke free from their unit and it was up to three nurses all female and one residential counselor to get them back on their unit. This of course did not work and the police were called. They did not want to come in and said they were not security for that building, but eventually did help when they found out the residents had taken the keys and soon it would become their problem. I have only been there two weeks and I have resigned, but I am left with questions of what a facility uses for security, and what or whom should I contact, because this was the mildest of the crisis I witnessed in two weeks. Is this "the norm"????? Thank You

[Whispera, MSN, RN]

I've worked at two psych facilities. The first was within a general hospital and security was awesome--they came quickly if called, and were extremely helpful. The second was at a freestanding psych hospital. Security in the daytime was one elderly man, who couldn't help much and moved very slowly. At night there was no security. Big men worked on all units though, as nurses and techs, and they took care of security issues pretty easily.