You would think that a corporation would have lawyers reviewing their policy, but apparently that doesn't happen nearly as often as you'd think.

I once found a provision in our policy that states a doctor can order security to take medications from a patient if they deemed those medications was against the best interests of the patient. The policy referenced a law, so I looked it up. It didn't exist. Specifically, it had been repealed by something else which was EXTREMELY vague to the point of being completely useless for any practical purpose.

Out of curiosity, I went and looked at the old repealed law. It in fact DID NOT SAY ANYWHERE, at any point, neither in draft nor in final form, that doctors could order patient medications be removed from patient control without patient consent UNLESS the patient was under an involuntary hold. In any other context, it would be theft, battery, etc., depending on what applied.

I took this to a policy review board meeting between front line staff. I had a list of notes and explained it to the meeting organizer. Nurses who had never even looked up a law let alone this one told me I must be wrong because they firmly believed they could order a guard to basically take a patient's meds because the nurse "thought they might be a drug user." The lawyer waved it off as me probably misinterpreting the law. I said "there is no law. The current one says, verbatim, 'healthcare facilities are responsible for setting policy regarding patient own medications.' Nothing else. I read it."

Completely ignored. They also stupidly wanted to store patient's controlled medications in an unsecure box in the patient's room because it was less work than documenting it, which was... not allowed, because it's a fucking controlled substance.

Looking out for the best interests of the security team and our patients, I forwarded my meeting notes to my manager and he escalated it. Was one of the last things I did before I left the industry forever. I was already burned out, but fuck, dude. Never assume someone who has a BA or a law degree knows what they're talking about, because they often don't.