According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Wolf, Delao, & Perhats, 2014), most of the physical assaults and nonfatal injuries, that required days off from work were suffered by health care workers. There are many debates and arguments on this subject, hence the reasons and motives of such behavior on the part of patients and visitors are not detected or understood clearly.
Dynamic of Violence in Human Services Settings
The issue occurs all over the word, and according to the statistics, the amount of assaults has dropped down from the peak of 442 per 100 000 in 1992 to 242 per 100 000 in 2012 (Sumner et al., 2015). Violent behavior is defined by any physical assault, harassment or threat or any emotional abuse. It is not as crucial for some employers though. They do not provide the staff with necessary safety and protection. Researchers claim that institutional violence was discussed thirty years ago. They supposed that the reason for such behavior was a lack of security on the part of the government, employers, and society. Thus, many people get into institutions with a weapon, and nobody knows about it. However, others do take care of these issues, try to find ways to manage the problem.
Intervention Strategies
It is clear that measurements to decrease the violence are necessary. Rallying the staff and their managers, improving the workplace conditions and ambience, and making workers help and support each other are the most important steps toward fighting the problem. The staff and administration should all come together and study the violent behavior, and reasons for it. It is important to understand what is going on.
The aftermath of violence can be different and vary from a rude tone to homicide. The highest level of such incidents is concentrated in prisons and hospitals. Convicts are an example of it: conditions that the prison has to offer influence people’s brain and provoke disorders. Therefore, staff often becomes a victim of prisoners’ violence and aggression.
Following up with Victims
The most acute problem occurs in the profession of nursing. Researches have shown that over the year 2014, for instance, 76% of different age nurses experienced physical or mental violence in the workplace (Speroni, Fitch, Dawson, Dugan, & Atherton, 2014). They report a violent behavior of visitors and patients. As a result, it is obvious that nurses leave their jobs because they do not feel secure in the institution. They feel anxiety, frustration and depression.
Precipitating Factors
A terrifying amount of aggressive attacks is detected in psychiatric hospitals, where patients sometimes are not able to control themselves at all. There are different kinds of asylums where people suffer from mental disorders, hallucinations, violent fantasies, delusions, and psychical illnesses. Apparently, the level of anger, aggression, and violence is very high there.
Institutional/Staff Culpability
It is certain that the problem is inside of workplace settings. Poor self- esteem, intimidation, powerlessness cause disagreements among the staff. Some people argue that this is the problem of the settings in institutions, which causes mental issues. Others support the idea that aggression is in the nature of people; otherwise, they would not turn out to be convicts in the prison or patients of the clinics after all. Nevertheless, all agree on the necessity of raising the security level for institutions and their employees. Roberts (2015) estimates that empowerment and leadership are the key measures to decrease the problem of violence in institutions, especially in the nursing field. It is important to alter a nursing workplace culture.
In conclusion, it is obvious that violent behavior in institutions is a tremendous problem, which needs to be handled by the government, by providing people better working condition. As was shown in the paper, the problem of violent behavior of visitors and patients is mainly concentrated in the nursing department because of their powerfulness. Thereby, it is clear that health care should ensure greater security for their employees.
References
Roberts, S., J. (2015). “Lateral violence in nursing: A review of the past three decades”. Nursing Science Quarterly, 28(1), 36–41.
Speroni, K., Fitch, T., Dawson, E., Dugan, L., & Atherton, M. (2014). Incidence and cost of nurse workplace violence perpetrated by hospital patients or patient visitors. Journal of Emergency Nursing, 40(3), 218-228.
Sumner, S., Mercy, J., Dahlberg, L., Hillis, S., Klevens, J., & Houry, D. (2015). Violence in the United States. JAMA, 314(5), 478.
Wolf, L., Delao, A., & Perhats, C. (2014). “Nothing changes, nobody cares: Understanding the experience of emergency nurses physically or verbally assaulted while providing care”. Journal of Emergency Nursing, 40(4), 305-310.