Supporting Organizations

OSHA: Behavior Modification

Provide all employees with training in recognizing and managing assaults, resolving conflicts, and maintaining hazard awareness.

Occupational Safety and Health Administration

“ Workplace violence has emerged as an important safety and health issue in today’s workplace” OSHA

How can workplace violence hazards be reduced?
In most workplaces where risk factors can be identified, the risk of assault can be prevented or minimized if employers take appropriate precautions. One of the best protections employers can offer their workers is to establish a zero-tolerance policy toward workplace violence. This policy should cover all workers, patients, clients, visitors, contractors, and anyone else who may come in contact with company personnel.
By assessing their worksites, employers can identify methods for reducing the likelihood of incidents occurring. OSHA believes that a well-written and implemented workplace violence prevention program, combined with engineering controls, administrative controls and training can reduce the incidence of workplace violence in both the private sector and federal workplaces.
This can be a separate workplace violence prevention program or can be incorporated into a safety and health program, employee handbook, or manual of standard operating procedures. It is critical to ensure that all workers know the policy and understand that all claims of workplace violence will be investigated and remedied promptly. In addition, OSHA encourages employers to develop additional methods as necessary to protect employees in high risk industries.

OSHA & Worker Safety: Engineering Solutions to Workplace Violence: Prevent workplace violence via safety-enhancing design and equipment. Environment of Care News, Volume 17, Number 3, March 2014, pp. 1, 3, 4, 11(4)
With workplace violence on the rise, health care workers have learned tactics to help protect themselves, such as recognizing and de-escalating potential violence. But what about using the facility architecture itself and other engineering tools to shield workers, patients, and visitors from harm? This article explores some of these tools, and offers examples of how they’ve worked in actual situations.

Joint Commission: Issue 24 June 2016

Code Black and Blue: Why patients turn violent and how to recognize it before it happens. Environment of Care News, Volume 18, Number 1, January 2015, pp. 1,3,4(3)

Violent behavior toward nurses, physicians, and hospital staff is an occupational hazard that every healthcare organization will encounter. Staff, particularly frontline staff, need to be aware of the risk and know how to deal with it. This includes preventing incidents, knowing what to do when a patient becomes violent, and following procedures for reporting an incident. This article discusses strategies for preventing and addressing violence in health care organizations.

Bullying has no place in healthcare.

Issue:

Civility is a system value that improves safety in healthcare settings. The link between civility, workplace safety and patient care is not a new concept. The 2004 Institute of Medicine report, “Keeping Patients Safe: Transforming the Work Environment of Nurses,” emphasizes the importance of the work environment in which nurses provide care.1 Workplace incivility that is expressed as bullying behavior is at epidemic levels. A recent Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) report on workplace violence in health care highlights the magnitude of the problem: while 21 percent of registered nurses and nursing students reported being physically assaulted, over 50 percent were verbally abused (a category that included bullying) in a 12-month period. In addition, 12 percent of emergency nurses experienced physical violence, and 59 percent experienced verbal abuse during a seven-day period.2

“Workplace bullying (also referred to as lateral or horizontal violence) is repeated, health-harming mistreatment of one or more persons (the targets) by one or more perpetrators. Bullying is abusive conduct that takes one or more of the following forms:

• Verbal abuse
• Threatening, intimidating or humiliating behaviors (including nonverbal)
• Work interference – sabotage – which prevents work from getting done3

There are five recognized categories of workplace violence:4

1. Threat to professional status (public humiliation)
2. Threat to personal standing (name calling, insults, teasing
3. Isolation (withholding information
4. Overwork (impossible deadlines)
5. Destabilization (failing to give credit where credit is due)”  

–    Joint Commission

Other organizations that care about Violence in the Healthcare Environment:

American College of Emergency Physicians

Emergency Nurses Association

Connecticut College of Emergency Physicians

Stop the Bleed

Connapa