A survey of workplace violence and its related cognition and demands of nurses in emergency de-partment

Abstract

Objective To describe the prevalence of workplace violence against nurses in emergency departments, and investigate its related cognition and demands of nurses. Methods A total of 385 emergency department nurses from 13 general hospitals in Beijing were recruited by convenient sampling method and were investigated with the Version of Hospital Workplace Violence Questionnaire in February to October 2014. Results The prevalence of workplace violence against nurses was 89.9% during the past 12 months. The incidence of verbal abuse, threat, physical assault and sexual assault were 89.9%, 70.6%, 20.5% and 3.9% respectively. The responses of nurses were mainly tolerance and avoidance, explain patiently and ask for help; 81.6% of the nurses considered that workplace violence was inevitable in the workplace, and 78.7% of the nurses thought the hospital was not capable of dealing with workplace violence in the past. The nurses demanded that the hospital to increase the prevention of workplace violence training, to set up a sector to deal with violence events, or to take on workplace violence policy of zero tolerance. Conclusions Workplace violence against nurses is prevalent in emergency departments. Nurses hope the hospital to have more positive attitude against workplace violence and take more measures to prevent and deal with it. Further intervention should be conducted to reduce workplace violence against nurses by individuals, hospitals, the government and the whole society. Key words: Emergency room, hospital; Nurses; Cognition; Demand; Workplace violence