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INTRODUCTION

The International Healthcare Security and Safety Foundation (IHSSF) is the philanthropic arm of the International Association for Healthcare Security & Safety (IAHSS).  The 2014 IHSSF Crime Survey was commissioned under the Research and Grants Program of the International Healthcare Security and Safety Foundation (IHSSF).  The purpose of the 2014 IHSSF Crime Survey is to provide healthcare security professionals with an understanding of crimes that impact hospitals as well as the frequency of these crimes.

IAHSS members who serve in security leadership roles in hospitals in both the United States and Canada were invited to participate.  Specifically, we asked that the highest ranking hospital security professional (or their designee) at each hospital respond to the survey.  Those responding would ideally be responsible for maintaining the security incident management records.  We also asked that if the respondent was responsible for more than one hospital that one survey be completed for each hospital.

The 2014 IHSSF Crime Survey collected information on ten (10) different types of crimes that were deemed relevant to hospitals and included:

Murder

Rape

Robbery

Aggravated Assault

Assault (Simple)

Disorderly Conduct

Burglary

Theft (Larceny-Theft)

Motor Vehicle Theft

Vandalism

To ensure that all hospitals were answering the questions consistently, regardless of state or province, the survey included the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Uniform Crime Report definition (US) and the Criminal Code Definition (Canada).  The definitions for each crime are located in the Appendices to this report.

For analytical purposes, murder, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault were aggregated into a group called “violent crimes.”

We received 386 responses from both US (n=338) and Canadian (n=47) hospitals.  Of those 386 responses, 242 provided usable responses. These 242 hospitals account for:

  • 209,818,780 square feet (including on-campus clinics, research space, medical office buildings, etc.)
  • Over 56,000 hospital beds
  • An average daily census of around 85,000 people