Free Hospital CCTV Layout CCTV Design Tool
Hospitals are 24/7 environments with patient privacy as a hard line. This layout covers EDs, corridors, medication rooms and parking with cameras placed where they protect — never inside treatment rooms or wards.
24-64
Typical cameras
5,000-20,000 sqm
Typical area
Patient privacy is non-negotiable
challenge
Recommended camera zones
| Zone | Camera type | Qty | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Emergency department | Dome / PTZ | 4-8 | PTZ at the apex of the waiting room plus dome at triage desk — face-readable, audio if regulations allow. |
| Medication / pharmacy rooms | Dome / High-Res | 2-4 | Two domes per room: one over the door, one over the controlled-substance cabinet. 4 MP+, evidence-grade. |
| Corridors and stairwells | Dome | 10-30 | Corridor-mode dome every 20–25 m. Avoid pointing into patient rooms — angle along the corridor axis. |
| Parking garage | Bullet / IR | 4-12 | ANPR bullet at entry, IR bullets at lifts and stairwells, perimeter coverage at the building edge. |
| Loading dock / supply | Bullet | 4-10 | Bullet covering deliveries, dome inside the supply room — incident-grade evidence on stock movement. |
Key challenges for
Patient privacy is non-negotiable
No cameras in patient rooms, treatment areas or examination rooms. Period. Cover thresholds — corridors leading to rooms — and document the policy with the hospital's data-protection officer.
24/7 operation, no maintenance window
You can't take cameras down for firmware updates during a Saturday-night ED shift. Use enterprise-grade cameras with redundant PoE, dual stream and remote update, and rolling maintenance schedules.
Access control: medication and biohazard rooms
DEA/EU medication rooms and biohazard storage need camera + access-control overlap. Pair a high-res dome with the lock event log; investigations need both.
Crowd: ED waiting room volatility
EDs see 50–200 people per shift, with periodic violence flashpoints. Use cameras with strong WDR and fast frame rate (25+ fps) to capture incident detail in chaotic conditions.
Pro tips for
Walk every corridor with the data-protection officer BEFORE finalizing camera positions — privacy lines move depending on local interpretation.
Pair every locked door (medication, biohazard, IT) with a camera covering the threshold from the corridor side.
Set medication-room retention to 90 days — DEA/MHRA inspections often surface weeks late.
Use cameras with audio capability disabled by default — most regimes treat hospital audio recording as wiretapping.
Plan redundant NVRs in separate fire zones — hospital uptime requirements don't tolerate single-storage failure.
Frequently asked questions
Can we put cameras in patient rooms?
Almost never. Patient consent under HIPAA, GDPR or local equivalents would have to be active and revocable, and most hospitals find it isn't worth the legal exposure. Cover thresholds, not interiors.
How many cameras for a 200-bed hospital?
Typically 32–64: 4–8 ED, 4–8 corridors per floor (3–6 floors), 2–4 medication rooms, 2–4 entrances, 8–12 parking, 4–6 loading. Larger trauma centres easily push to 80+.
What retention should hospital footage have?
30 days for general areas, 90 days for medication and high-value areas, 7 days for crowd-control areas like waiting rooms unless an incident is logged. Local data-protection guidance may require shorter retention.
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