By Brenda Flanagan
Correspondent
Several units from Paramus Police and the County Sheriff’s Department responded to Bergen Regional Medical Center today shortly after a day patient ignored staff pleas to return and walked off the campus there, according to a sheriff’s spokesman who said the patient was legally free to leave. The medical center, which offers mental health and detox treatment, would not confirm the incident. But serious, ongoing security issues at the 1,000-bed facility drew a strong response from the Bergen County executive yesterday.
“Effective immediately there will be increased officer presence on the BRMC campus,” said James Tedesco.
Tedesco said the sheriff and prosecutor will conduct a threat and vulnerability assessment for the entire campus. And he instructed the private company BRMC — contracted to operate the medical center — to hire an independent, outside consultant to evaluate patient and worker safety there.
He advised the company “to make every effort to prevent patients from harming themselves, other patients or the people caring for them.”
Tedesco’s announcement followed a recent report in The Record, documenting patient-on-patient assaults — even against young children in the mental health unit. The union that represents health workers at the medical center welcomed the executive’s initiative.
“And we think that is great. We’ve been asking for that. And it has to be by people who now how to do it. I had — know of — nurses who retired because they couldn’t stand getting hit all the time,” said Executive Director Ann Twomey.
Twomey says the center’s understaffed and workers are overwhelmed.
“It has become such the norm that we have violence, that we have outbreaks of patients fighting,” said nurse Delfina Guevara.
“It’s staffing issue. Why wasn’t somebody at the room when these things were happening?” said nurse Jeffrey Peck
Nurses report attacks by patients in mental crisis.
“It’s their psychosis that takes over. Some of them come high on drugs. I’ve seen security guards be picked up, slammed on the floor; another one who has gotten punched and knocked to the ground,” said Guevara.
The medical center pointed out it’s in contract negotiations with the union and remains “…committed to a safe patient and employee environment,” and that in terms of injurious assaults, “Bergen Regional falls favorably below that national benchmark and also compares favorably to the rates of state psychiatric hospitals.”
The center’s fighting serious citations from OSHA that “…its workplace violence program was not effective.” Its contract to run the medical center expires next year.
Reports of violence at the medical center prompted state lawmakers to call for an investigation. They want more details, increased transparency and better protection for staff and patients here.