Our Public Safety team comes in to work with one thing on their mind, keeping Saratoga Hospital safe for our patients and for our staff – because, at the end of the day, we all want to go home, we all want to go home safe, we want everybody safe. It takes a special type of person to be a part of our public safety team at Saratoga Hospital because you never know what the next phone call will be.
Interviewer:
These are the voices of Saratoga Hospital. Shared moments and insights to help us all understand a little-bit more about the constantly changing world of health and care, close to home. Our public safety team comes into work with one thing on their mind, keeping Saratoga Hospital safe for our patients and for our staff.
Danielle Jourdan:
Because at the end of the day, we all want to go home. We all want to go home safe. We want everybody safe.
Interviewer:
There is constant training for Code Amber, a missing baby, for Code Red, a fire, and techniques to de-escalate a volatile situation. Our public safety team works with police agencies across the region including Homeland Security. And then, there's making sure the loading dock is open for the Pepsi guy.
Marvin Maldonado:
My goal, in any situation, is to de-escalate the situation. One of my old coaches used to tell me, when you go into a situation and somebody's agitated and then you fall into that agitation, now you've become part of the problem rather than the solution.
Danielle Jourdan:
My name is Danielle Jourdan. I've been here at the hospital for five years. I have been in this field since I was 16 years old. Started off dispatching for park wide services at the Great Escape, security, EMS, the whole gamut.
Marvin Maldonado:
My name is Marvin Maldonado. I've been with Saratoga Hospital since 2015. I've worked every single shift in our department, from day shift, to evening, to overnights. That's where I met Danielle. Uh, Danielle and I have worked together for, I believe, about a year or so, or a little over a year?
Danielle Jourdan:
To-, yeah.
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah.
Danielle Jourdan:
A year or two.
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah. We're, uh, June 21, two females. We're trying to encourage more females to come on.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yep. And, I was the first one in 10 years.
Marvin Maldonado:
That was, that was quite a change for (laughs), for us.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yeah.
Marvin Maldonado:
We had to adjust when that came about.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yeah. I don't know if they really adjusted. As a female in this field, you end up being one of the guys, per se. I, sometimes, I feel like the mother of the department, and sometimes I feel like I'm just one of the guys. I've got a bunch of my brothers around me. (laughs).
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah. I think that's a huge avenge for us, on having females on our team. 'Cause a lot of times, yeah, you're right. You know, you have somebody, you have a male who's completely agitated and not listening to anybody. And then we have, you know, four or five guys coming and we also have a female, and a lot of times, just having a female in front of them, kind of, gets them to de-escalate.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yeah. If, I wasn't experienced, one midnight, I was dealing with a female patient in crisis, and across the hall there was a very large man, going nose to nose yelling at one of our very large men. And, I took a timeout from dealing with what I was dealing with, made sure that was good, and stepped across the hall, and kinda, just disbursed the situation a little and he worked with me just fine. It's all in, in the presentation.
Marvin Maldonado:
We have a variety of people or members, in our department, we have ex-military, we have retired police officers, we have social workers, we have people who hold master's degrees, and that's something that I don't think people realize. We work with just about every law enforcement agency, close and far from Warren County to Saratoga County, State Police, Homeland Security.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yeah. And, that's one thing a lot of people don't think about. Racing season. A lot of high profile people come into the area. Homeland Security, does, give us a call, realizing that we're part of the community. This is where someone would come if someone, high profile, had a medical emergency.
Marvin Maldonado:
I always find that fascinating. That, if something happens, okay, this is the plan, and it's for us to know what's going. The Public Safety Department and the Saratoga Hospital Staff, I- I believe we have a really close relationship, and we work together well. So much so, that we can look at each other, and without even saying that, I can just step forward and intervene in whatever's going on. We want to make sure that everybody's safe when they're doing their job.
Marvin Maldonado:
The training in our department, credits due, David Nelson, our coordinator, he does really well with our education, and he keeps up-to-date with everything, not just in our department, but the whole Saratoga Hospital staff, the emergency department, ICU, MHU. The mental health area is where they need it, so that way they can protect themselves and keep the patients safe.
Danielle Jourdan:
We're also trained, Code Amber, with a baby missing, to Code Red, fire drill, and how to respond to it, to, team training, techniques for effective aggression management, so people know how to respond.
Marvin Maldonado:
I would have never thought that we will be teaching a doctor, how to perform restraint.
Danielle Jourdan:
Yeah.
Marvin Maldonado:
How to keep somebody down on the bed.
Danielle Jourdan:
But, you mentioned a very important point, working with police and helping them in the emergency room. Whenever they come in with people, they give us a call that they're coming in, and that they want our assistance.
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah.
Danielle Jourdan:
And, want us to be there. So, that says a lot, I think, for our department, as, they know that they can work with us. They know that they're comfortable working with us, that we'll have their back. And that, we're always there for them, the patient and the staff, because we want to be that front line.
Marvin Maldonado:
Mm-hmm.
Danielle Jourdan:
We want to able to interject when something doesn't feel right. We are in a beneficial spot to be able to come in to de-escalate, and at that time, getting to hold that person steady, so they can come, so they can look you in the eye and connect with you. Telling them to look you in the eye, communicating with them while you're holding them steady, to keep themself safe and to keep staff safe.
Danielle Jourdan:
Even, rubbing their hand, something as simple as the other day, I said, can I hold your hand. She's known to be violent, so I held her hand for a second. She wasn't feeling good, her stomach hurt, her head hurt, a lot was going on with her. But, at the same time, I rubbed her hand, because she said many times before to us, I just want to be loved. I need somebody to love me.
Danielle Jourdan:
So, being that person to be there for her, to be able to rub her hand, and she ended up rubbing back and it, kinda, brought us together for that moment. Being able to push the hair out of somebody's eyes when it's there, and that's what's bugging them, that's part of the trigger of what's going on.
Danielle Jourdan:
So, we have a really great spot to be able to connect with these people, and stop and slow things down. Slow things that can be such a volatile situation, bring it down, bring it back to life. At the end of the day, I think, as a department, as a whole, we realize that there's humanity in everybody, and that's our goal, is to find, find what is deep down in them, that's irritating them. We all had those feelings. Trying to get a deeper understanding of, exactly, what they're going through.
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah.
Danielle Jourdan:
I'm a security instructor for the State, for State security guard licensing. And, I tell people all the time, your biggest benefit, the biggest tool that you have on your belt is, your mouth, and being able to use it correctly, and being able to de-escalate situations. Because, at the end of the day, we all want to go home, we all want to go home safe, we want everybody safe. The better that we can use our mouth and be able to communicate with people, the better we'll get our job done. A way of, less incident.
Danielle Jourdan:
I think the main reason that Marvin and I both teach techniques for effective aggression management, because at the end of the day, eh- we will be there. We will be there the minute you need us. We'll be the first one's there. We'll have your back. But, at the same time, we need people to take their safety into their hands, too. And, take these trainings, and take care of themselves, be aware. Not everybody's nice, uh, we have little old ladies be very combative. We've had very young children be very combative. We will be the first ones there with them.
Danielle Jourdan:
We have one person that comes in, she used to come in with her mother when she was younger. And, if you look at her, she walks with this, thousand yard stare, her hair is crazy. If, she likes you and, you'll know she likes you, because she will give you a nice big, toothy grin. Sometimes, she'll come in angry, and that's when we get called. We get called when people are in crisis. We don't always get called when their happy. Getting to know her and knowing that she knows, that she knows us, and she's comfortable with us, is really what we thrive on.
Danielle Jourdan:
Being able to say to her, hey, how are you? What's going on today? What's made you mad today? What we can we do to help that? And, that's, really, where we're at with her, now, because we've dealt with her so much. We're able to say, "Hey, what made you mad today?" And, we can work with it from there. She has drawn me a picture that is now in my locker. (laughs). And, I keep asking her to draw me more.
Marvin Maldonado:
What's that picture?
Danielle Jourdan:
It looks like her, with a little interpretation, it looks like her, with a bunch of different colored crayons.
Marvin Maldonado:
This made me think about that time we were... Remember, I had to put a tiara on, because somebody was just having a fit, and I think they always carry a tiara. And, here I am, she gave it to me. She told me to put it on, so I put it on.
Danielle Jourdan:
One of my favorite parts of working with some of these guys. Like, they end up being just like your brother, and this big burly guy that you see in front of me, MMA fighter, is putting a tiara on for a patient, to make them feel comfortable. (laughs).
Marvin Maldonado:
(laughs). Yeah.
Danielle Jourdan:
That's really how our department is, as a whole, and it's beautiful.
Marvin Maldonado:
The Public Safety Department, as served to a hospital, it's just, not only are we a team, but we're a team with all the rest of departments in the buildings. Did I ever ask you what your first experience was, downstairs in, in the morgue?
Danielle Jourdan:
We are the gatekeeper of the morgue. That, is one of our most important tasks, because they are still a patient, and they are still someone's loved one. And, regardless of how they passed, what's going on in their circumstances, they are loved and they have somebody that loves them back.
Marvin Maldonado:
I don't think people are aware of the fact that, that's something that we run into when a family member needs to come here and identify the body. And, we have to be there if they, all of sudden go in crisis, that we have to able to, to handle a situation, like that. I don't want to call it a challenge, but it's just one of the responsibilities.
Marvin Maldonado:
Somebody who comes into a trauma room, in the emergency department, we are there. We're there. And, the reason being is, we're there as a presence. But, I've seen in- in my experience here, where I had a 16 year old. It still kinda takes me back a little-bit, because I remember the father who was so upset, and he just lost it. And, it becomes our job to, make sure he doesn't hurt himself, the father, and he doesn't hurt anybody else there, because he's so upset that, the fact that he just lost his son.
Marvin Maldonado:
Do we tell him to stop and sit down, or be quiet? Or, do we just let it happen, let him grieve? I had a difficult situation like that, and i- it's so difficult, and it takes a lot of experience for somebody to just sit back, and just, okay, just let it happen. Let him grieve for the moment. The chair that he just broke, we can replace that, no problem.
Danielle Jourdan:
Our day, it really, runs the gamut. People acting out-
Marvin Maldonado:
Coming in intoxicated, mental health issues, car accidents, you name it. This, is just so unpredictable.
Danielle Jourdan:
Back to, opening the back door, for the vendor to get in, for Pepsi to get dropped off. (laughs). It's boring, until it's not, is what I like to say.
Marvin Maldonado:
I mean look at our phones, they never stop ringing. Once that phone rings, we don't what we're gonna get, and we gotta be ready for it. To have for an answer for the person on the other side. That's, what I like about the job, so much.
Danielle Jourdan:
Or, if, when you picked up a shift, calling home to your family, and saying, "Hey, just wanted to say goodnight to the girls." Just wanted to get my kids to sleep. And, seeing a car pull in and it ignite, in flames, and going, oh, game on. And, I think that's one reason our department is so goofy, as well. Because we do deal with the high energy, high emotion situations. Going back to the office to relax, to debrief, to let it out, to be goofy together, and just breathe.
Marvin Maldonado:
Yeah.
Danielle Jourdan:
This job is very boring, until it's not. And when it's not, it's not, and you know it. Expect the unexpected.
Interviewer:
It takes a special type of person to be part of our Public Safety Team at Saratoga Hospital, because you never know what the next phone call will be. All episodes of this podcast, Voices of Saratoga Hospital, can be found on our website, saratogahospital.org/voices and on your favorite podcast channel.