For the Seager Memorial Clinic in Ogden, Utah, a recent expansion brought new challenges in managing access, protecting sensitive areas and maintaining operational efficiency. To overcome these challenges, the clinic partnered with ProdataKey (PDK) and Pye-Barker Fire & Safety to implement a modern, scalable access control system.

The Seager Memorial Clinic is a 501(c)(3) free clinic providing medical, dental, vision, mental health and pharmacy services to underserved individuals in and around Ogden, Utah. Its patients are often uninsured, underinsured, unhoused, transitioning out of jail or navigating unemployment.

Despite the variety of services, the clinic operates with a very small core team. “We just have three employees, including myself, who actually work at the clinic,” said Jerika Mays, executive director of the clinic. “The rest are all volunteers — physicians, dentists, pharmacists, pre-med students. It’s really a community-driven effort.”

That community is substantial, and with a volunteer force of more than 300 individuals, the clinic regularly hosts anywhere from 10 to 15 volunteers at a time. These volunteers allow the clinic to serve as many as 20 to 30 patients in a brief three-hour window of service. Over the course of 2025, that volunteer service translated to nearly 3,000 patient visits. This dynamic volunteer environment makes flexible and secure access control essential — setting the stage for the clinic’s partnership with ProdataKey.

For many years, the clinic operated in the basement of the Ogden Rescue Mission, a local homeless shelter. This 750-square-foot basement space included three exam rooms, a dental room, an area to take vitals and a small pharmacy. The space limitations directly impacted the clinic’s ability to operate efficiently and expand its services, so the decision to relocate was a no-brainer.

On Oct. 29, 2025, the ribbon was cut at the new Karl & Erika Michel Center: a 7,000-square-foot facility dedicated solely to the operations of the Seager Memorial Clinic. While the move to this brand new space opened many doors for the clinic and its healthcare offerings, it also required some serious thinking about security with a larger space comes more sensitive areas, more entry points and more complexity.

The clinic had already taken its first step towards high security in 2023 when it became a licensed charitable pharmacy.

“We initially had ProdataKey set up in our pharmacy, because all pharmacies need certain security measures in place,” Mays said. “It was just one room, but it was a huge deal for us.”

As Mays and her team contemplated how to move from this small-scale system to a much larger implementation, the team at Pye-Barker Fire & Safety rose to the occasion.

“I was in touch with the renovations advisor for their new location, and he told me all about the clinic and the people they were serving,” said Clint Beecroft, regional director, Pye-Barker. “It excited me knowing that it fell right in line with who Pye-Barker is as a company. Our purpose statement is to create peace of mind together as we protect what matters most — and that’s what Seager Memorial Clinic is doing too.”

As with any access control project, the installation at the clinic’s new location began with lots of planning. “Every access control install starts with visiting the customer and finding out what their security needs and concerns are,” Beecroft said.

To kickstart the project for Seager Clinic, he approached the clinic’s team with a handful of key questions:

• What is the size of the project?
• How many points of access will be controlled?
• Do they need to manage who comes in, or who comes in and who goes out?
• How many users will be interfacing with the system?
• What credentials are they interested in?
• Do they want to utilize phone technology and Bluetooth?

With that critical information in hand, Beecroft and his team were able to draw up a detailed security plan for the clinic, involving access control from PDK as well as integrated video surveillance cameras. The final security plan saw the Pye-Barker team setting up controlled access throughout the interior and exterior of the facility.

At the very core of the installation was a need for simplicity, reliability and flexibility, especially given the clinic’s reliance on an ever-evolving volunteer force.

“When partnering with access control equipment suppliers, one of the main things we’re looking at is what their end user interface looks like,” Beecroft said. “How easy will it be for our customer to manage their system, to add and delete users, or add and change schedules? Based on this, PDK was the right fit.”

ProdataKey’s cloud-based system allows the clinic to issue, update and revoke credentials as needed, providing greater flexibility as Mays and her team facilitate the in- and out-flow of volunteers. Volunteers are provided with a mix of fobs and key cards, all configurable in the PDK.io management platform.

“With PDK, we can assign credentials to volunteers easily, and we can even program different rules based on people’s jobs,” Mays said. “For example, the volunteers for our eye clinic are the only ones who can get into the eye clinic room, which has sensitive equipment and supplies.”

Customizable Groups and Access Rules in PDK.io have empowered the team at Seager Clinic to have detailed control over their space and workforce. This control is critical for protecting expensive equipment, as well as sensitive information and medications — all without slowing down operations.

Beyond protecting critical equipment and information, the PDK access control system has proved to be a necessary technology for creating peace of mind amongst staff and patients at the clinic. For Mays, the ability to remotely monitor the system is vital. “I will often open the app and just poke around and look at the status of the building,” she explained. “It gives me peace of mind being able to check in at any time.”

In addition to monitoring, remote management and mobile credentials in the PDK Access app allow Mays and her staff to perform critical tasks and operations from afar. “I use the ability to let someone in from my phone weekly,” Mays said. “For example, I recently had someone coming to do repairs in the building. I was able to hop on a phone call and just say, ‘Are you there?’ and then let him in. Not having to drive to the clinic and use a key to let them in is a much better use of my time.”

ProdataKey’s remote capabilities are critical for more than the end-user; they empower service providers like Pye-Barker to support their customers anytime and anywhere. “Having the ability to provide support to customers remotely is a great tool,” Beecroft said. “We’re able to help our customers out by logging into their systems for maintenance and technical support.” This allows Pye-Barker to tackle issues and provide support quickly, enhancing the customer experience.

For the Seager Memorial Clinic, growth is all about providing more critical services to larger amounts of people in need. But with growth comes security challenges. With its 80-year history helping to protect businesses and communities, the team at Pye-Barker Fire & Safety was able to introduce ProdataKey as the perfect solution.

“Jerika and the organization she’s a part of are providing a service that’s absolutely needed, and I’m honored to have been given the opportunity to work with them,” Beecroft said. “And I really love the fact that I had such a strong relationship with the PDK team. They were the right fit for this customer and ready to help us provide this service to Seager Memorial Clinic.”

By introducing secure and efficient access control, ProdataKey has empowered Seager Memorial Clinic to create a space where staff, volunteers and patients alike can feel safe, seen and supported.