Mobile Infirmary Adds De-Escalation K-9 Teams
By J. Thomas Wade
Blue RAM Media/Gulf Coast News
October 27, 2026
MOBILE, Ala. Nationwide, healthcare facilities have used dogs for security details and for therapy and crises.
There are many hospitals that have guns and bomb sniffing dogs patrolling about the property with security personnel to prevent firearms from entering the facilities.
This week the Mobile Infirmary Protection services unit is also adding three specially trained K-9 de-escalation teams and will work with their protection officers in hopes that the dogs will be able to help calm people down and de-escalate certain situations Mary Tabor, vice president and chief nursing officer.
Tabor said that the dogs who are named Cayde, Star, and Pete, will be partnered with hospital officers and patrol the entire complex.
Tabor did not say why the decision was made to add the dogs but said that they’ll be put into service officially on November 15th.
“If there’s any escalation that surfaces and we need their attention, they will be deployed to that area,” Tabor said. “And working with our current security team and the handlers, I believe they’re going to make eye contact with one another. And we’ll know when we need the dogs and when we don’t need the dogs””.
In other hospitals where K-9 teams are deployed, they’ve been widely well received and shown to both de-escalate situations as well as be protective of patients and staff.
“The dogs are going to be focusing on learning the hospital, learning arrival patterns, and just all of the staff,” Tabor said. “And getting everybody safe and comfortable.”
It’ll take a while for the dogs to learn the more than one million square foot facility she said.
Due to a rising trend in violence against medical staff, the hospital integrated the specialized dogs as we have implemented a lot of other measures.
This is just one of the measures that we’ve implemented here at the hospital,” Susan Boudreau, president of Mobile Infirmary, said.
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